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EDMUND BURKE 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 The easiest way to remember the facts about the life 
 of Burke is to arrange them under four heads corre- 
 sponding to four periods of his life. Consider the first, 
 of nineteen years, to bring him to his graduation from 
 Dublin University in 1 748 ; the second, to his election to 
 Parliament in 1765 ; the third, to the height of his active 
 public service, in 1782; the fourth, to his death, in 1797. 
 
 Burke's Early Life. 
 
 Burke was brought up in the Protestant faith of his 
 father, who was an attorney of good repute in Dublin, 
 albeit a man of irritable disposition. Burke's mother, a 
 Roman Catholic, was a large-minded, well-connected 
 woman, with a strong hold upon the affection and rev- 
 erence of her son. We shall see that the son inherited 
 both the impatient temper of his father, and the liberal 
 mind of his mother. Before entering college, his mind 
 and temper were trained with great skill by a Quaker 
 schoolmaster, Abraham Shackleton, towards whom 
 Burke ever felt the sincerest respect and gratitude. In 
 college his course, while desultory and whimsical, 
 formed a valuable brooding period for both intellect and 
 moral purpose. He himself describes it as a series of 
 passionate sallies into various heights of learning, saying 
 
vi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 that he passed from the furor mathematicus, through the 
 furor logicus and the furor historicus, to the furor 
 poeticus. Like young Francis Bacon, he took all knowl- 
 edge to be his province. 
 t 
 How Burke Came to be in Parliament. 
 
 When Burke was twenty he went to London, to the 
 Middle Temple, to study law. But his interest was not 
 continuous, his ambitions were literary and social, his al- 
 lowance was withdrawn, and a period of several years 
 began which passed in obscure conflict with fortune. But 
 1756 saw the publication of two notable essays, and, what 
 was of even greater import, his marriage to Miss Jane 
 Nugent, like Burke's mother, a Catholic and an ideal 
 wife. The first of the essays was A Vindication of 
 Natural Society, a brilliant piece of irony purporting to 
 be a posthumous work of Lord Bolingbroke, so cleverly 
 imitated as to deceive skilled contemporary critics. The 
 second pamphlet soon followed, in Burke's own name, 
 entitled A Philosophical Inquiry into the Origin of 
 Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful. This was a 
 serious effort towards a psychological explanation of the 
 origin of the standards of art. Lessing and Kant are said 
 to have received valuable suggestions from it. 
 
 As a consequence of the reputation made by these and 
 other published works, and by the intimacy with the 
 great literary men of London which Burke now enjoyed, 
 he was invited in 1759 t0 furnish the brains for a 
 periodical called the Annual Register, which Dodsley, 
 the bookseller of Pall Mall, wished to publish. Burke 
 was to receive ^100 per annum for an account of the great 
 current events of the year. For thirty years he attended 
 
INTRODUCTION. vn 
 
 faithfully to this chronicle-editing, often glad of the 
 moderate income it assured him. For six years from this 
 time, he also received an income of several hundred 
 pounds from a Mr. Hamilton, secretary to Lord Halifax 
 in Ireland, for services of a perfunctory kind. But over 
 against his happy marriage and his good beginning as an 
 author, was the inexorable fact that he was not his own 
 master, and that therefore he must serve whom he must, 
 not whom he would. The must was to Burke's mind, 
 very unsatisfactory. He wished to do some original 
 literary work, and felt that his nature and ability called 
 on him to do so ; but his patron, with a selfishness which 
 now appears blind as well as obstinate, insisted on his un- 
 divided service ; so Burke with passionate disgust and 
 sense of injury, threw up his pension, and declared his 
 independence in 1765. 
 
 He was thirty-six years old, when by virtue of that for- 
 tune which is said always to favor the brave, he was 
 elected to Parliament from Wendover, a borough, in the 
 pocket of Lord Verney who was an adherent of Lord 
 Rockingham. The friendship of Lord Rockingham for 
 the young " Encyclopedia of political knowledge " does no 
 less credit to the nobleman's generous insight, than it did 
 service to Burke. The close of the year in which Ham- 
 ilton lost a secretary, saw England gain a statesman. 
 
 Burke's First Seventeen Years in Parliament. 
 
 The ministerial changes from 1765 to 1782 were nu- 
 merous and important. Grenville's administration which 
 had begun in the year of the Peace of Paris, 1763, was 
 marked by far-reaching error in colonial affairs, culmi- 
 nating in the passage of the Stamp Act, in 1765. Then 
 
viii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 came the Rockingham ministry, with Burke as its secret 
 but powerful guiding spirit, which was dissolved as soon 
 as it had shown a disposition systematically to undo the 
 evil previously done, but not before the Stamp Tax had 
 been removed in 1766, and Burke had made a deep im- 
 pression as orator and publicist. 
 
 Chatham followed, with a cabinet which Burke de- 
 scribed as a tesselated pavement without cement. Burke 
 was offered a place in this cabinet, and was urged even 
 by Lord Rockingham to accept it, but he preferred to 
 stand by his party, and till the death of its leader in 
 1782, he never wavered in party or personal allegiance 
 to the Rockingham Whigs. His first public service after 
 his friends were out of office was the publication of Ob- 
 servations on the Present State of the Nation. His role 
 was to bolster up the interest, the information, the oratory 
 of his party leaders, and at every opportunity to speak or 
 write so as to impress their principles upon the public. 
 
 Chatham failed to unite the Whigs, was taken ill, and 
 resigned the government to the Duke of Grafton. In the 
 three years of Grafton's administration, the king's ob- 
 stinate desire to rule America with an arbitrary hand 
 brought about the most unjust and oppressive legislation. 
 But the timidity which accompanies the bullying temper, 
 stirred by the threatening aspect of colonial commerce, 
 repealed most of the obnoxious measures, leaving in 
 1769, as a monument of the supremacy which dared not 
 be quite supreme, the Tax on Tea. 
 
 To Lord North, who was prime minister from 1770 to 
 1782, was left the legacy of discontent in the colonies, 
 fixed tyranny in the spirit of the king, and as an instru- 
 ment of legislation, the Tories coupled with a body of 
 
1NTR OD UCTION. i x 
 
 corrupt and menial Whigs. The first five years of 
 North's administration completed preparations for the 
 American Revolution by a series of irritating penal laws. 
 The good-natured minister, easily tuning his voice to the 
 royal ear, demanded the recognition of the supremacy of 
 Parliament and the consequent subservience of America. 
 The whole object was to teach America a lesson, and as 
 parts of that bitter instruction the provinces of Mas- 
 sachusetts and New York were especially subjected to 
 discipline. 
 
 The opposition fought in vain. Neither Chatham in 
 the House of Lords nor Burke in the House of Com- 
 mons could persuade a venal and benumbed political 
 conscience to conciliate America. After three years of 
 fighting, when France and Spain had joined the colonies, 
 and when the popular reaction in England revolted 
 against further bloodshed amongst their American kins- 
 men, Lord North himself yielded every point in the con- 
 test and even the king was silenced. But it was too late; 
 the counsels of generosity and justice could avail nothing 
 at such a day, and the colonies were alienated forever. 
 
 America was not the only object of legislative con- 
 cern during these troubled years, but it may fairly be 
 said to have been the most pressing, and the most full of 
 consequence to the future of England. For it must be 
 remembered that statesmen like Chatham and Burke were 
 not alone in seeing that the subversion of English liber- 
 ties in America meant the subversion of English liberties 
 at home. On all accounts, therefore, it is natural that 
 we should pass lightly over the activities of Burke in 
 other directions, while especially emphasizing his work in 
 behalf of constitutional freedom. 
 
x INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Throughout the struggle of John Wilkes for his jir *y 
 won seat in the House of Commons, Burke fcaght 
 strongly on the side of liberty of election. In 1770, in 
 the midst of threatening anarchy, was published his 
 Thoughts on the Present Discontents, a calm and power- 
 ful exposition of the nature of true government, and a 
 conservative proposition for rendering Parliament more 
 truly representative of the national will. In November, 
 1774, six months after his speech on American Taxation, 
 Burke was honored with an unsought election to Parlia- 
 ment from Bristol, commercially the second city in the 
 realm. His speeches at Bristol are of interest from the 
 light they throw upon his theory of the duties of a popu- 
 lar representative — a trustee of his constituency. 
 
 The March of the following year saw Burke delivering 
 his speech on Conciliation to a parliament of ears that 
 heard not. Seventy members of that house sat for rotten 
 boroughs which were the property of the king ; about a 
 hundred and fifty more were controlled by borough- 
 jobbing nobles like the Duke of Newcastle, and were at 
 the disposal of the king ; a great number more were own- 
 ers of estates whose highest political ambition was to 
 lighten their burden of taxes by exacting a war-revenue 
 from America. Several seats, at a time when it cost a 
 decent man thousands of pounds to secure a seat for 
 honorable service were occupied by the puppet-officers of 
 the royal household. There was no doubt how the 
 turnspit of the king's kitchen would stand on questions 
 of sacrifice of personal advantage for the public good, 
 none about the position of the groom of the stole or his 
 treasurer, the steward of the household or his retinue, the 
 board of green cloth, or the board of works. It is easy 
 
INTRODUCTION. xi 
 
 to st how such parliamentarians as these would regard 
 appeals to magnanimity as in politics the truest wisdom, 
 and how much they would listen to, and understand, of 
 the profound, the historical, the logical, the literary, in 
 the speech on Conciliation. 
 
 All this mass of political corruption Burke deliberately 
 attacked in 1 780, when there was nothing further for him 
 or any one else to do towards redeeming the colonies, in 
 his schemes of Economical Reform. No project of his 
 was ever more successful than that for reducing the num- 
 ber of sinecure offices used as bribes, and the number of 
 political pensions. He succeeded also in checking the 
 outflow from the treasury through bad fiscal arrange- 
 ments. The paymaster of the forces, for example, had 
 managed with passive honesty to derive a salary of about 
 thirty thousand pounds. Burke reduced it to a definite 
 four thousand. 
 
 To sum up the period, this Burke, who cast the choicest 
 of English oratory before seats which were either quite 
 vacant, or occupied by loungers eating nuts and oranges, 
 was in the House and out, the real leader of the Rock- 
 ingham Whigs ; while Lord North, blind to justice and 
 deaf to mercy, followed with the unprincipled majority, 
 the course dictated by an ignorant populace and a selfish 
 king. When Cornwallis surrendered, North resigned and 
 King George again reluctantly invited the Marquis of 
 Rockingham to form a cabinet (1782). 
 
 The Last Fifteen Years of Burke's Life. 
 
 Even in this second Rockingham cabinet Burke re- 
 ceived no place. Why, we do not fully know ; but we 
 do know as Burke himself said, that a hunt of obloquy 
 
x i i 1NTR OD UCTluN. 
 
 had ever pursued him with a full cry through life, and 
 that amongst other natural rewards withheld, was this 
 honor of a place in the ministerial circle. However, he 
 was installed in the pay office whose salary he had just 
 reduced, and with a proud humility labored on in behalf 
 of his party and his principles. After three months of 
 office, Rockingham died, and Burke refused to serve 
 under Shelburne, who soon gave place to the coalition 
 between Fox and Lord North, under the nominal leader- 
 ship of the Duke of Portland. But Burke, who had been 
 reappointed to the pay office, favored Fox's unwise and 
 unsuccessful India Bill, and fell with the ministry (1783), 
 while the younger Pitt became prime minister and re- 
 mained so till his death in 1806. 
 
 There are some elements of tragedy in the final decade 
 of Burke's life. In the great impeachment of Warren 
 Hastings, which he conducted, and in which he rendered 
 justice and England valuable service, he failed of his im- 
 mediate object. After the lapse of a century we can see 
 that failure as a mere disguise, obscuring the purification 
 of British rule in India ; but to Burke, the fourteen years 
 of close application to every phase of the case seemed 
 thrown away when Hastings was acquitted. 
 
 But a far more tragic experience was the unmerited 
 success, which he gained through his bigoted and pas- 
 sionate hostility to the French Revolution. It is true 
 that no motive could be more unselfish, no devotion to 
 the ideals of a lifetime more faithful. But his view of 
 the situation in France was narrow and mistaken, and 
 therefore his championship was unjust to many of those 
 very interests which he had fostered with his deepest 
 affection for years. Many of those liberal, true, and 
 
INTRODUCTION. xiii 
 
 prophet-like principles regarding the sense of a whole 
 people, the adequate motives of nations, the small value 
 of untried force, and so on, were forgotten in his panic 
 lest the prerogative of an ancient nobility should be im- 
 paired or the feelings of an intriguing queen bruised and 
 neglected. More than all this, it is strange to find the 
 steady and hard-headed English people, gradually veer- 
 ing to his side, and sharing his anxiety lest the order of 
 things in England should be subverted as in France. 
 
 Still more tragic was the change that came over the 
 spirit of Burke in his public utterances, in the closing 
 years of his parliamentary career. From the height of 
 reason we find him descending to the blindest prejudice; 
 instead of the nobility of an historical philosophy we see 
 him employing personal abuse ; for a never- failing stream 
 of hopeful eloquence coupled with inexorable logic, we 
 find pessimistic threatenings of disaster and a voice break- 
 ing into screams of angry protestation. 
 
 Such passion and perverseness could not fail to react 
 upon his relations with men ; so it is with sadness, but 
 not surprise that we read of the breach of friendship with 
 his party in 1791, and especially with Fox, with whom 
 he quarreled publicly over a difference regarding France. 
 His disagreement with the party which should have been 
 his, brought out his Appeal from the New to the Old 
 Whigs, a reaffirmation of the position he had taken in 
 the Reflections on the French Revolution (1790). This 
 position was supported also by a series of Letters on a 
 Regicide Peace, which urged England to force Pitt, the 
 peace-minister, into war with France, and filled all Eng- 
 land with dread of impending anarchy. 
 
 But apart from these aberrations the real Burke ap- 
 
xiv INTRODUCTION. 
 
 peared, in the last years of his active life, in two mas- 
 terpieces of cool and solid thinking ; one an economic 
 tract marking out prophetic lines of free-trade, entitled 
 Thoughts and Details on Scarcity, the other, the Letter 
 to a Noble Lord, a defence against attacks upon his pen- 
 sion by two pampered noblemen, which Morley calls the 
 most splendid repartee in the English language. 
 
 With the close of the trial of Hastings, Burke had 
 retired from Parliament (1794). Shortly afterwards the 
 king made known his intention of bestowing a peerage 
 upon him. But at the critical moment his son Richard 
 died, and the title was of course withheld. To the broken- 
 hearted statesman, however, bowed under heavy debt as 
 well as years and sorrow, was granted through Pitt's 
 efforts a substantial pecuniary relief. Even this tardy 
 and partial recognition of his public service was not long 
 to be enjoyed. He died at the age of sixty-eight, at 
 Beaconsfield, in 1797. 
 
 Burke as a Man. 
 
 Green gives a graphic description of Burke's personal 
 appearance in the House of Commons. "The heavy 
 Quaker-like figure, the little wig, the round spectacles, 
 the cumbrous roll of paper which loaded Burke's pocket, 
 gave little promise of a great orator." But this picture 
 is quite unlike that drawn by several of Burke's friends, 
 who saw him at an earlier period in life or under other 
 circumstances. It is also quite unlike the impression 
 one gets from certain of the portraits we have of Burke — 
 that by Reynolds which ought to be the truest, or that 
 by Romney which certainly harmonizes with what we 
 should expect in Burke's face. Fortunately our basis for 
 
INTR OD UCTIOiX. x v 
 
 judgment of his character is far more satisfactory than the 
 contradictory evidence regarding his personal appearance. 
 His charm in conversation is attested by the most 
 brilliant women in France, as well as England, and in 
 everything but wit he was the recognized peer of Johnson 
 in the Literary Club. There it was that Burke was best 
 known and loved. Johnson's admiration was not deeper 
 than his friendship, and his feelings towards Burke were 
 shared by Reynolds, Goldsmith, Garrick, Gibbon, Bos- 
 well, Windham and the rest. Goldsmith in his Retali- 
 ation, amongst the epitaphs on various members of the 
 club, gives a playful description of Burke. Intelligently 
 construed the lines give a remarkably complete idea of 
 his character. 
 
 Here lies our good Edmund, whose genius was such, 
 We scarcely can praise it or blame it too much ; 
 Who, born for the universe, narrowed his mind, 
 And to party gave up what was meant for mankind ; 
 Though fraught with all learning, yet straining his throat 
 To persuade Tommy Townshend to lend him a vote ; 
 Who, too deep for his hearers, still went on refining, 
 And thought of convincing, while they thought of dining; 
 Though equal to all things, for all things unfit : 
 Too nice for a statesman, too proud for a wit, 
 For a patriot too cold, for a drudge disobedient, 
 And too fond of the right to pursue the expedient. 
 In short, 'twas his fate, unemployed, or in place, sir, 
 To eat mutton cold, and cut blocks with a razor. 
 
 The fact is that Burke's whole life was an effort to 
 apply the gifts of genius to the purposes of practical life. 
 This serves the world, and honors the man ; but the 
 process is fraught with unspeakable suffering. The 
 
xvi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 noblest trait in Burke's character is his superiority to the 
 rejection of his best efforts, by those whom he would have 
 benefited. He went on with apparent complacency, to 
 do the next good deed. Confident of his position in the 
 right, and aiming too high to see petty obstacles in his 
 own path, he was moved by a philanthropy which was as 
 modest as it was sincere. Ambition never tempted him 
 unless it appeared clothed in honor and animated by the 
 good of mankind; and notwithstanding the rumors of 
 low connections in business and religion which never 
 ceased to affect his public station, no single irregularity 
 has ever been proved against him, though the record of 
 his life has been searched again and again by the lynx- 
 eye of personal and partisan hostility. 
 
 The one apparent exception to this statement deserves 
 special comment. When Burke had been but a short 
 time in Parliament, kffo^b. as he was to have no consid- 
 erable income and no fortune 7 at all, he surprised his 
 friends and piqued the jealousy Of 'his. enemies, by the 
 purchase of an immense estate, valued at ^22,000. To 
 maintain such a residence would have required, a^ixed 
 income of ^4,000. Here, twenty-four miles from Lon- 
 don, he established a stately family-seat, which he called 
 Beaconsfield, after the parish in which it was^ situated. 
 
 Such extravagance is hard to understand even in a 
 man of genius, and an Irishman at that. But fixity, 
 deep-rootedness, was a passion with Burke, and his life 
 was devoted so far as his family interests were concerned, 
 to laying plans for a notable posterity in a fitting environ- 
 ment. To cherish such hopes was no small part of his 
 religion, and it was with religious seriousness that he 
 sought to realize them. Beaconsfield was a farm of three 
 
INTRODUCTION. xvii 
 
 thousand acres. Burke became an enthusiastic student 
 of agriculture. It was here that he took refuge from the 
 turmoil and disappointments of political strife, and it 
 was here that he received, with infinite hospitality, both 
 the great men of the Literary Club, and any unfortunates 
 whose situation he could improve. Here, also, it was, 
 that two exiled Indian devotees, who could find no peace 
 in unfeeling London, were permitted to make a temple 
 of Burke's summer-house. And after his fruitless strug- 
 gle on behalf of the old order in France, and after the 
 desolating blow of his own son's death, Beaconsfield was 
 thrown open as the home and school of sixty orphans of 
 the French nobility. 
 
 If there be a higher morality than that which regulates 
 business affairs, perhaps the light-hearted improvidence 
 which ended in so much^harity, may be justified on 
 ethical grounds. Meanwhile let us say that as the well- 
 earned pension under the management of Mrs. Burke 
 eventually canceled every debt of money, and as the im- 
 providence was more than compensated for by Burke's 
 distress of mind, the account may fairly be considered 
 closed and the debtor free. 
 
 Burke in Public Life. 
 
 Burke's chief principles of government may be dis- 
 covered in the Speech on Conciliation, though they come 
 out more definitely upon research in a broader range of 
 his utterances. A catalogue of his fundamental rules 
 would read thus : Seek to preserve everything possible 
 that time has consecrated ; adapt the operation of forces 
 to suit present conditions ; be satisfied with less than the 
 ideal; be generous rather than exacting; remember there 
 
xviii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 is a higher justice than that framed in the law ; and that 
 all laws derive their efficacy from the spirit of obedience 
 in the people. 
 
 The first of these principles is the one to which Burke 
 was most emphatically committed. Birrell calls him the 
 " High Priest of Order," and Perry, "the great pleader 
 for conservatism." He was conservative by nature and 
 education. When innovations threatened, conservatism 
 was the only thing worth living for. Reform, says he, is 
 not change, but "a direct application of a remedy to the 
 grievance complained of." In his Letter to a Noble 
 Lord, he describes the way he went to work upon the 
 problem of Economical Reform. "I heaved the lead 
 every inch of way I made. ... I proceeded upon 
 principles of research to put me in possession of my 
 matter; on principles of method to regulate it; and on 
 principles in the human mind and in civil affairs to secure 
 and perpetuate the operation." 
 
 He goes on to express the feeling which Morley has 
 pointed out as an essential element in his philosophy, a 
 mystical reverence for the supernatural power which 
 alone he believed could have raised a "political edifice." 
 " I have ever abhorred, since the first dawn of my under- 
 standing to this its obscure twilight, all the operations of 
 opinion, fancy, inclination and will, in the affairs of gov- 
 ernment, where only a sovereign reason, paramount to all 
 forms of legislation and administration, should dictate. 
 Government is made for the very purpose of opposing 
 that reason to will and caprice, in the reformers or in the 
 reformed, in the governors or in the governed, in kings, 
 in senates, or in people." 
 
 T^he remaining principles cited in the catalogue, since 
 
INTRODUCTION. xix 
 
 the Speech. on Conciliation fully illustrates them, need no 
 special comment here. There is a wide difference how- 
 ever between merely seeing the rule by which Burke did 
 his work, and appreciating the work itself. The art of 
 the statesman is a thing quite beyond the principles of the 
 publicist. In the effort to follow Burke in the practice 
 of his profession, it is well to attempt two lines of thought : 
 first a comprehension of the living realities which fur- 
 nished his motives and dictated his mode of treatment ; 
 second the power, and method, and beauty of the oratory 
 in which he worked. 
 
 Burke's affections were always warm towards any per- 
 son or people in distress, except the French mob. In 
 their case special considerations blinded him to one half 
 the truth. But in regard to the common people of Eng- 
 land, the struggling peasants of Ireland, the colonists of 
 America, his position was uniformly sympathetic. He 
 knew their condition and he believed in their privileges, 
 therefore, always for the sake of order, he made their 
 cause his own. 
 
 So truly did he do this in actual practice, that he de- 
 liberately sacrificed the seat in the House to which he had 
 been elected by the great constituency of Bristol. The 
 issue was between justice to the trade of Ireland, and to 
 the religion of the Roman Catholics in England, on 
 the one hand, and the wishes of the great com- 
 mercial corporation on the other. Burke never hesi- 
 tated. True to the view of the duty of a representa- 
 tive which he had avowed boldly on the day of his 
 election at Bristol, he chose the course dictated by 
 his reason and conscience, in defiance of their will. 
 His championship of the American cause still further 
 
xx INTRODUCTION. 
 
 estranged him from this valuable constituency. It is 
 true he addressed the sheriffs of Bristol in an impassioned 
 and closely reasoned letter in 1777 on behalf of the 
 soundness of his views; and in 1780 he spoke to the 
 electors of Bristol words on the subject of true free- 
 dom, that should have won their renewed allegiance. 
 But their hearts were hardened, and Burke cheerfully 
 gave place to a more docile representative. 
 
 Burke's experience as an orator was full of contradic- 
 tions. The most obvious of these was that while the 
 greatness of a speech was conceded, the due effect was 
 scarcely ever gained. Some of his most powerful ad- 
 dresses were ignored. The Speech on Conciliation, 
 which is considered on the whole his greatest, utterly 
 failed to secure its legislative object. The explanation 
 of this contradiction is to be found largely in the prej- 
 udice of his audience. 
 
 But even to those who listened with sympathy to 
 Burke's speeches there was no such degree of satisfaction 
 as the reading of them afterwards afforded. This fact 
 seems to indicate that as essays they are greater than 
 as orations. And from the practical point of view there 
 is much justice in this conclusion at first. But another 
 item must be taken into account. Burke's delivery was 
 exceedingly rapid. So much so that none but a great 
 political philosopher like himself could have compre- 
 hended the intricacies of his discourse as he delivered 
 it ; and we have no report from any such philosopher. 
 The witnesses are upon the whole, but second-rate ob- 
 servers. They lay far more stress upon the inevitable 
 faults of manner in Burke's delivery than upon the pas- 
 sionate sincerity with which his words were uttered. It 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxi 
 
 is his harsh voice, his brogue, his awkward gestures, his 
 overearnest shaking of the head, and his facial contor- 
 tions which to them stand for Burke's oratory. No 
 doubt also they felt called upon to explain to themselves 
 as they listened, why it was that Burke's oratory was un- 
 popular, and so they hit upon every mannerism their 
 shallow criticism could detect. 
 
 Another strange fact about Burke as an orator is that 
 while discoursing with a breadth of mind and liberality 
 of policy which few statesmen have equaled, he would 
 exhibit a personal irritation entirely out of character with 
 bis sentiments. This peculiarity was largely constitu- 
 tional, but was fostered by harrassing debt, by failure in 
 projects into which he had thrown his grandest efforts, 
 and by a sense of the inexorable personal and party prej- 
 udice against which he had to fight with unfit weapons, 
 until it became at times a painful thing even to his friends 
 to observe his frantic utterance, in the heat of extempore 
 debate. Yet forgetting these petty failings we can see 
 in Burke, a ready and skilful disputant, whose knowl- 
 edge was infinitely accurate and varied, and who, in a 
 parliament more worthy of his presence, would have 
 towered like a god among heroes. 
 
 The real power of Burke's oratory is shown in its 
 effect upon the generations who have followed him. 
 One after another their great statesmen have led the way 
 to victory for one or another of Burke's ideas. For three- 
 quarters of a century his works have been the text-book 
 of British statesmen and economists. Our noblest 
 Americans have formed their public characters upon his 
 ideal. Almost every advance in political reform was 
 prophesied in his principles of government, and so 
 
xxii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 rapidly has his philosophy become a common possession 
 that we find it hard to realize the newness of many posi- 
 tions when he took them in the eighteenth century. 
 
 Notwithstanding all this, it is doubtful whether the 
 oratory of Burke, if he could now share in the delibera- 
 tions of our American Congress, would command its full 
 measure of respect. It is characteristic of the mind of 
 man to accept only a little of what he hears, especially 
 if that which is offered be out of harmony with his own 
 lines of thought and interest. No appeal, however 
 eloquent, however sane, however persistent, will take 
 away the settled prejudices of the mass of mankind, till 
 some other influence has first broken through the shell 
 of indifference. This fact does not argue against the 
 employment of every persuasive art, or detract from the 
 dignity of argumentative oratory. But it does help to 
 explain why Burke, who perhaps surpassed every other 
 man in the list of English orators, apparently worked in 
 vain. 
 
 The Speech on Conciliation. 
 
 It was of Nature that Emerson said, "the eye sees 
 what the eye brings with it the power of seeing." But 
 it is equally true of a great work of art, that the beauty 
 and value of it to a student are to be measured only by 
 the student's appreciation. We start out with no mean 
 standard when we aim to understand why the greatest 
 critics have looked upon this as a great speech, and to 
 see for ourselves what their eyes had power to see. 
 Their judgment and their enjoyment mean but little to 
 us, if we cannot, guided by them, judge and enjoy for 
 ourselves. 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxiii 
 
 A fundamental criticism on Burke as a political writer 
 has been passed by Matthew Arnold in the brief sen- 
 tence, " What makes Burke stand out so splendidly 
 among politicians is that he treats politics with his 
 thought and imagination." The Speech on Coticiliation 
 is a great political document and a classic oration, be- 
 cause Burke treated the questions regarding America 
 u with his thought and imagination." 
 
 Burke never wearied of expressing disapproval of 
 theorists, but he appealed constantly to the deep truths of 
 statecraft, constantly correcting his views by reference to 
 specific examples in history and to plain facts of human 
 nature. His works contain the results of profound re- 
 search in every field of learning, presented in an easy 
 continuity, as if to permit the reader to live through 
 Burke's mental processes as he reads. The habit of 
 thorough examination of facts and application of princi- 
 ples grows unconsciously, and one is stimulated to think 
 in spite of himself. 
 
 But the secret of Burke's suggestiveness is not his 
 philosophy alone. Others have thought deeply and 
 logically without impregnating the minds of their readers 
 with their scholarly spirit. Burke vivifies his facts with 
 imagination. Even commercial statistics are made to 
 seem alive. And where an opportunity presents itself, 
 the art of a poet is drawn upon to embellish his posi- 
 tion, and render it attractive. How easily a mere 
 debater could have passed by the whale-fisheries of 
 New England with a statement of the bare facts of its 
 big areas, its stupendous tonnage, and its importance to 
 English trade. But Burke treats the fishermen with his 
 imagination. 
 
xxiv INTRODUCTION. 
 
 " Whilst we follow them among the tumbling mountains of ice, 
 and behold them penetrating into the deepest frozen recesses of 
 Hudson Bay and Davis Strait, whilst we are looking for them be- 
 neath the Arctic Circle, we hear that they have pierced into the 
 opposite region of polar cold, that they are at the antipodes, and 
 engaged under the frozen serpent of the south. Falkland Island, 
 which seemed too remote and romantic an object for the grasp of 
 national ambition, is but a stage and resting-place in the progress 
 of their victorious industry. Nor is the equinoctial heat more dis- 
 couraging to them than the accumulated winter of both the poles. 
 We know that whilst some of them draw the line and strike the 
 harpoon on the coast of Africa, others run the longitude and pur- 
 sue their gigantic game along the coast of Brazil. No sea but 
 what is vexed by their fisheries. No climate that is not witness to 
 their toils. Neither the perseverance of Holland, nor the activity 
 of France, nor the dexterous and firm sagacity of English enter- 
 prise ever carried this most perilous mode of hardy industry to the 
 extent to which it has been pushed by this recent people — a people 
 who are still, as it were, but in the gristle, and not yet hardened 
 into the bone of manhood." 
 
 The clear vision, of which Arnold spoke, peers into the 
 history of Wales under penal regulation, and brings forth 
 pictures like this. 
 
 " I admit it fully ; and pray add likewise to these precedents, 
 that all the while Wales rid this kingdom like an incubus ; that it 
 was an unprofitable and oppressive burden ; and that an English- 
 man traveling in that country could not go six yards from the high- 
 road without being murdered." 
 
 It peers into the geography of America and presents 
 the colonists in the very act of migration. 
 
 " If you drive the people from one place, they will carry on their 
 annual tillage and remove with their flocks and herds to another. 
 . . . Already they have topped the Appalachian mountains. 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxv 
 
 From thence they behold before them an immense plain, one vast, 
 rich, level meadow ; a square of five hundred miles." 
 
 It peers into the very hearts of the Americans and sym- 
 pathizes with their passionate love of freedom, with their 
 religious prejudices, their social tendencies ; and it sees 
 the English kinship with these passions as a living truth. 
 With what deadly vividness is this set forth before those 
 unseeing eyes of the British House of Commons ! 
 
 " We cannot, I fear, falsify the pedigree of this fierce people and 
 persuade them that they are not sprung from a nation in whose 
 veins the blood of freedom circulates. The language in which 
 they would hear you tell them this tale would detect the imposition; 
 your speech would betray you. An Englishman is the unfittest 
 person on earth to argue another Englishman into slavery." 
 
 Upon the ill-omened projects of tyranny it looks with 
 the eye of scornful condemnation. Burke is speaking of 
 the plan to free the slaves that they may fight against their 
 masters. 
 
 " An offer of freedom from England would come rather oddly, 
 shipped to them in an African vessel, which is refused an entry 
 into the ports of Virginia or Carolina, with a cargo of three hun- 
 dred Angola negroes. It would be curious to see the Guinea cap- 
 tain attempting at the same instant to publish his proclamation of 
 liberty and to advertise his sale of slaves." 
 
 The imaginative quality of these passages loses by the 
 fact of quotation. In their places, set in the system of 
 Burke's thought, these five and a hundred others con- 
 tribute to that suggestiveness, which every one must dis- 
 cover in every page of the oration. They come from an 
 exercise of the imagination, and often produce the effect 
 of great poetry. There is nothing in them of the license 
 
xx vi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 of mere irresponsible fancy ; every image is tempered 
 into truth, and subjected to the law of reason, but it 
 spurs and urges on the reader's mind. Page after page 
 passes before us, and by some fascination like that which 
 draws the eye from arch and spire of a great cathedral to 
 view from within "stoned window and fretted vault," 
 we feel ourselves seized upon by the passion of the orator, 
 and swept out of our common mood into new relations to 
 his theme. We share his reverence for the subject, his 
 love of justice and the constitution, his faith in clemency, 
 and his hatred of tyranny and fraud. 
 
 But the speech is by no means all in this lofty vein. 
 Mr. Bliss Perry says, "Burke could always be gorgeous 
 when he chose, and severe when he must." There is 
 little of the Speech on Conciliation that may justly 
 be called gorgeous in style ; but there is no dearth of 
 passages of severe prose. The oration is of the class 
 argumentative or deliberative. There are few words in 
 the whole speech which do not, directly or indirectly, 
 lead towards conciliation and away from tyranny. The 
 tone of the speech is conciliatory. The Speech on Tax- 
 ation in America which Burke delivered almost a year 
 earlier, is quite of another type in this respect. That, 
 says Goodrich, " was in a strain of incessant attack, full 
 of the keenest sarcasm, and shaped from beginning to 
 end for the purpose of putting down the ministry." But 
 in the present oration we have balanced judgment, nice 
 attention to the means of persuasion, a spirit of philan- 
 thropic administration of colonial affairs as a trust re- 
 posed in Parliament. Combined with all these traits, is 
 a body of argument which is at the same time detailed 
 and extensive, systematic and powerful. 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxvii 
 
 The purpose is twofold. It_c onsists in general of an 
 effort to convince the House of the need of serious and 
 just treatment of the American colonists, by emphasiz- 
 ing the magnitude of American commerce, and the 
 dignity and energy of American character. His thought 
 runs in this channel : " The abuse of America arises from 
 carelessness and ignorance ; if I can prove that America 
 is great and respectable in material importance and in 
 character, I shall gain at least a new and earnest attitude 
 from the House." It is here that he introduces his elabo- 
 rate exposition of American commerce, agriculture, and 
 fisheries, and of the American spirit of liberty arising 
 from six causes, every one of which is separately defined 
 and argued. 
 
 Following this effort to produce a just attitude of mind 
 towards the American question, Burke introduces what 
 is called an argument by exclusion, to show that in 
 the light of the facts just adduced, there is only one 
 proper way in which to treat America. An enumeration 
 of all the proposed courses of action is made ; one after 
 the other the various modes of procedure are proved im- 
 practicable, until only one is left. Then comes the posi- 
 tive demonstration of the justice of this conclusion. The 
 great body of the speech, from paragraph sixty-five to 
 paragraph one hundred and seventeen, is devoted to 
 showing how a conciliatory policy would operate favor- 
 ably upon America. Within these limits, the most note- 
 worthy type of argumentation is the appeal to the ex- 
 amples of four other provinces of England. This is 
 called argument by historical analogy. As an. argument 
 by exclusion is of no value unless the enumeration of 
 possibilities be complete, and the cancellation of the un- 
 
xxviii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 wise, just j so an argument from historical analogy is 
 misleading unless the cases considered be parallel in 
 their essential conditions, and the conclusion drawn from 
 the one shown to be justly applicable to the other. A 
 study of the arguments of Burke ought to demonstrate 
 both the truth of his inferences and the fulness and in- 
 genuity of reasoning by which he reaches them. 
 
 To touch upon Burke's art of reasoning is to open a 
 subject of indefinite research, but it may be well to lay 
 the stress of brief comment upon three of its subdi- 
 visions. 
 
 The enforcement of an argument is invariably marked 
 by a careful preparation, a graceful introduction, a state- 
 ment and restatement of the question, and a laying of 
 emphasis upon the essential point. This effect of em- 
 phasis is gained in various ways, some of them depend- 
 ent upon the style of expression and too subtle to be classi- 
 fied ; but a favorite method is the denial of the opposite. 
 This may in itself require some amplification, or it may 
 consist in a flash of light thrown upon the absurdity to 
 which his enemy's position is reduced. Other modes of 
 enforcement, such as straightforward illustration, exposi- 
 tion of principles involved, and the hundred arts of style, 
 may form a most interesting topic for original work. 
 Some suggestions appear later in this introduction but the 
 individual insight is the best worker in this field, as in 
 others. 
 
 In the art of persuasio7i, Burke falls far short of most 
 great orators. His temper was too uncompromising and 
 his attitude too impersonal. He was not naturally tact- 
 ful in expression, and he wearied his audience with the 
 very wealth of his knowledge. His arts were those of a 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxix 
 
 prophet, a scholar, a lecturer, rather than of a medium 
 of sympathy between righteousness, intelligence and 
 economy, and the average man. To men already pos- 
 sessed by the spirit of these things he speaks with un- 
 measured felicity, but character and intelligence were 
 not his audience ; and one of the prime demands upon 
 an orator is to adjust his hearers and his speech. Chat- 
 ham did it, Fox did it, Sheridan did it — all in that same 
 Parliament of inert and biased minds which the grand- 
 est conceptions and the most eloquent periods of the 
 Speech on Conciliation failed to move. 
 
 When we observed above Burke's habit of denying 
 the opposite of a position which he wished to sustain, 
 we anticipated one of his very important means of refu- 
 tation. From beginning to end the speech is character- 
 ized by brief pieces of refutation after this fashion, inter- 
 spersed among the divisions of direct debate. For ex- 
 ample, there is that remarkable digression against 
 the use of force, brought in in the midst of a dis- 
 cussion of the circumstances and character of the 
 colonists. In paragraphs sixty-six to seventy-six Burke 
 is occupied with refuting the arguments bearing upon 
 England's legal right to tax the colonies and the danger 
 of further demands if the revenue laws be relaxed. 
 Paragraphs ninety-five, ninety-eight and one hundred 
 and four illustrate the same principle. But the great 
 body of refutation occurs where it would be expected, in 
 paragraphs one hundred and eighteen to one hundred 
 and thirty-six, where the chief object is after all only an 
 elaboration of the principle already cited. Burke can- 
 not in the nature of things extensively devote himself to 
 answering arguments against his own plan, so he follows 
 
xxx INTR OD UCTION. 
 
 the method of attacking the tacit arguments implied in 
 the existence of Lord North's propositions. By down- 
 right ridicule, audacious rebuke, or piercing analysis, he 
 exhibits the unstatesmanlike policy of the leading foe to 
 conciliation. Flank movements outwit North's shrewd 
 but unprincipled strategy. While seeming to yield a 
 point gracefully to his opponents, he scores two for him- 
 self. Nothing is more characteristic of Burke than a re- 
 statement, with apparent liberality, of some tenet of the 
 oppressors, which is no sooner submitted to this test than 
 it appears honeycombed with meanness or with error. 
 
 " Thirdly, it does not give satisfaction to the complaint of the 
 colonies. They complain that they are taxed without their con- 
 sent : you answer that you will fix the sum at which they shall be 
 taxed. That is, you give them the very grievance for the remedy. 
 You tell them, indeed, that you will leave the mode to themselves. 
 I really beg pardon; it gives me pain to mention it; but you must 
 be sensible that you will not perform this part of the compact. For 
 suppose the colonies were to lay the duties which furnished their 
 contingent upon the importation of your manufactures, you know 
 you would never suffer such a tax to be laid. You know, too, that 
 you would not suffer many other modes of taxation. So that when 
 you come to explain yourself, it will be found that you will neither 
 leave to themselves the quantum nor the mode ; nor indeed any- 
 thing. The whole is delusion from one end to the other." 
 
 Though this paragraph is the last passage we shall in- 
 sert here, as means of illustrating Burke's mode of argu- 
 mentation, let it be remembered that in our discussion of 
 this theme we have touched but upon its very surface. 
 Even if our object has been fully attained, we have only 
 suggested ways of looking into it. No one knows any- 
 thing of Burke's power in this direction, until he has 
 made the speech, as a whole, part of his own mental life, 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxxi 
 
 so that it thinks itself over in his mind, as an organic 
 system of political philosophy. It should of itself work 
 in the reasoning faculties, with intense and increasing 
 energy, towards an ideal conception of government in 
 which the weak, the distant, and the loyal, are justly 
 treated by the strong, the central and the generous. It is 
 for this kind of government that Burke was pleading, and 
 to the true reader he pleads for the same to-day. 
 
 The language in which this system is set forth is diffi- 
 cult. But its difficulty is almost solely due to the char- 
 acter of the thinking. Wherever the thought is plain the 
 language is easy, and it is even rendered, by the genius 
 of Burke, somewhat simple even in passages of reasoning 
 the most complex. But when an earnest, wide-awake 
 mind has once begun to grapple with the problems in the 
 thought and imagination of the speech, there is no fur- 
 ther consciousness of obstacles in the way of understand- 
 ing special words or phrases. The whole effort of such a 
 student is directed, as it should be, towards seeing Burke 
 in his speech, " alive and passionate." 
 
 Incidentally, many things will catch his eye, as he 
 reads. For example, he will be impressed with the ele- 
 gance of Burke's style. There is no vulgar common- 
 place, no appeal to cheap applause, no hot invective. 
 An air of dignity pervades his utterance ; his manner is 
 that of a " gentleman of the old school." 
 
 " Fortunately I am not obliged for the ways and means of this 
 substitute to tax my own unproductive invention. I am not even 
 obliged to go to the rich treasury of the fertile framers of imagi- 
 nary commonwealths, not to the Republic of Plato, not to the 
 Utopia of More, not to the Oceana of Harrington. It is before, 
 rne, it is at my feet, — 
 
xxxii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 ' And the rude swain 
 Treads daily on it with his clouted shoon.' " 
 
 It is as part of this poised and high-bred manner that 
 we interpret those quaint apologies and deprecations, 
 those compliments and innuendoes which enliven the page. 
 
 But there is a deeper explanation of the elegance of 
 Burke's style. His spirit is high. Grandeur is native to 
 him ; it breathes forth from his lips as unconsciously as 
 goodness welled from his heart. And those full periods, 
 perfect in continuity, roll off with a rhythm which can- 
 not but be sustained, because it is the rhythm of the 
 thought or emotion itself. Burke's phrasing is as rotund, 
 his turns of thought as quick and varied, as those of 
 Johnson at his best, and for much the same reason. 
 Both were great men speaking from their hearts, in an 
 age which had not yet chastened the poetry out of daily 
 speech. The passage which best illustrates these quali- 
 ties is too long to quote here. But it will never be 
 thought too long to read, — paragraphs one hundred and 
 twenty-six to one hundred and twenty-eight, beginning, 
 " For that service, for all service, whether of revenue, 
 trade or empire, my trust is in her interest in the British 
 constitution." 
 
 Goodrich makes a substantial quotation from Burke 
 himself when he states Burke's idea of a truly fine sen- 
 tence, — " It consists in a union of thought, feeling and 
 'imagery — of a striking truth and a corresponding senti- 
 ment, rendered doubly striking by the force and beauty 
 of figurative language." 
 
 From a writer with such an ideal we should expect to 
 find what we do find, sentences rich in ornament. 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxxiii 
 
 Burke's style is distinctly more elaborate than that of the 
 best orators of our modern school, and his standards of 
 argumentative language are quite unlike those laid down 
 in our art of debate. He differs widely from several of 
 the great speakers of his own day in these respects. But 
 after his kind he is incomparable, and it is the secrets of 
 his style we are exploring. 
 
 Of kindred figures, irony is Burke's favorite. He oc- 
 casionally towers into sarcasm, but his natural resort is to 
 plain truth half veiled in formal compliment. In para- 
 graph ten he is speaking of the disappointing simplicity of 
 his plan for conciliation. 
 
 " There is nothing at all new and captivating in it. It has noth- 
 ing of the splendor of the project which has been lately laid upon 
 your table by the noble lord in the blue ribbon. It does not pro- 
 pose to fill your lobby with squabbling colony agents, who will re- 
 quire the interposition of your mace at every instant to keep the 
 peace amongst them. It does not institute a magnificent auction 
 of finance, where captivated provinces come to general ransom by 
 bidding against each other, until you knock down the hammer, and 
 determine a proportion of payments beyond all the powers of alge- 
 bra to equalize and settle." 
 
 FYequent as such passages are they are far outnumbered 
 by the bold, straightforward challenges with which he 
 brings up his opponents. The figures, upon which he or- 
 dinarily depends are the simple but suggestive metaphor 
 and simile, with an occasional hyperbole to heighten 
 effect, and interrogation to vary the mode of attack. 
 The last half of paragraph sixty-six illustrates all these turns 
 of expression in a single passage, together with antithesis, 
 parodox, and one of the finest examples of repetition, in 
 the speech. As an example of litotes, not the least valu- 
 
xxxiv INTRODUCTION. 
 
 able figure in debate, observe the close of paragraph four ; 
 it is the inevitable balance of his ironical mood in the 
 opening lines of the same paragraph. Both irony and 
 litotes involve self-control in the speaker. 
 
 " Sir, Parliament having an enlarged view of objects, made, dur- 
 ing this interval, more frequent changes in their sentiments and 
 their conduct than could be justified in a particular person upon 
 the contracted scale of private information. But though I do not 
 hazard anything approaching to a censure on the motives of former 
 Parliaments to all those alterations, one fact is undoubted, — that 
 under them the state of America has been kept in continual agita- 
 tion. Everything administered as remedy to the public complaint, 
 if it did not produce, was at least followed by, an heightening of 
 the distemper ; until, by a variety of experiments, that important 
 country has been brought into her present situation, — a situation 
 which I will not miscall, which I dare not name, which I scarcely 
 know how to comprehend in the terms of any description." 
 
 Before passing on to notice another group of orna- 
 ments in the style of Burke we must gather a somewhat 
 more definite idea of his use of metaphor. Ordinarily 
 the metaphors in the Speech on Conciliation are homely 
 and brief, merely having the effect of strength, bigness, 
 or some other quality in a heightened degree. Such are 
 the expressions, — "population shoots," " to wrest from 
 them by force or shuffle from them by chicane," "this 
 loosening of all ties and this concussion of all established 
 opinions." Metaphors of this type are to be found on 
 every page. But there are in the speech, contributing 
 to it *no small share of its total beauty and power, several 
 of a higher type — offspring of a poetic imagination. The 
 most obvious example is the twenty-fifth paragraph, in 
 which Burke pictures the sixty-eight years' change in 
 America as a revelation to Lord Bathurst. It has the 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxxv 
 
 imaginative if not the sympathetic eloquence of Webster's 
 apostrophe to Lafayette. But, interesting as this is, a more 
 appropriate example is the figure of the wine-press in para- 
 graph one hundred and thirty-three, — more appropriate be- 
 cause more in the direct current of argumentative thought, 
 while the other is to some extent an episode. 
 
 " Most may be taken where most is accumulated. And what is 
 the soil or climate where experience has not uniformly proved that 
 the voluntary flow of heaped-up plenty, bursting from the weight 
 of its own rich luxuriance, has ever run with a more copious stream 
 of revenue than could be squeezed from the dry husks of oppressed 
 indigence by the straining of all the politic machinery in the 
 world ? " 
 
 Aside from typical figures of speech, there is an ele- 
 ment of the poetic in Burke's style which is not less note- 
 worthy because it is pervasive, and incapable of scientific 
 analysis. What I refer to is a certain enrichment of his 
 language with treasures from his reading. Sometimes 
 this takes the form of quotation, but more commonly of 
 a passing allusion, suggested rather than made, to some 
 cherished phrase, which not only expresses the desired 
 thought, but conveys with it the subdued charm of as- 
 sociation. Such passages may well be thought the great- 
 est beauty of the speech, none the less because they can 
 be fully appreciated only by those readers to whom 
 the half-quoted phrases are familiar. Freedom is a 
 "common blessing, and as broad and general as the 
 air"; "Clouds indeed and darkness rest upon the 
 future"; "When the day-star of the English constitu- 
 tion had arisen in their hearts" ; "The immense, ever- 
 growing, eternal debt which is due to generous govern- 
 ment from protected freedom " ; " These are ties which, 
 
xxxvi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 though light as air, are as strong as links of iron." It is 
 in such rich fragments as these from Shakespeare, Milton, 
 the Bible, that Burke naturally expresses himself, occa- 
 sionally giving from these sources or from his favorite 
 Latin poets, a more literal quotation. His eloquent 
 Sursunt corda is drawn from the Roman Catholic 
 liturgy, while from the Philadelphia Address to Great 
 Britain echoes that telling phrase " the former unsus- 
 pecting confidence in the mother country." The 
 legends of the Minotaur and of the Roman daughter 
 contribute to his descriptions, picturesque events in his- 
 tory afford him illustrations, while nothing satisfies the 
 demand of his critical imagination but the most definite 
 and accurate details. The mountains are Appalachian, 
 the outlaws are English Tartars ; it is Angola negroes 
 whom the Guinea captain seeks to import, into Virginia 
 and Carolina. Payne has made a very happy illustra- 
 tion of this poetic quality of Burke's style, by quoting 
 the following passages side by side : 
 
 "In large bodies the circula- " In all the despotisms of the 
 tion of power must be less vigor- East it has been observed that 
 ous at the extremities. • Nature the further any part of the em- 
 has said it. The Turk cannot pire is removed from the cap- 
 govern Egypt and Arabia and ital the more do its inhabitants 
 Kurdistan as he governs Thrace; enjoy some sort of rights and 
 nor has he the same dominion privileges ; the more ineffica- 
 in Crimea and Algiers which he cious is the power of the mon- 
 has at Brusa and Smyrna. Des- arch; and the more feeble and 
 potism itself is obliged to truck easily decayed is the organiza- 
 and huckster. The Sultan gets tion of the government." — In- 
 such obedience as he can. — quiry into tlie Colonial Policy 
 Page 25. of the European Powers, by 
 
 Lord Brougham. 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxxvii 
 
 "This particularizing style is the essence of poetry ; 
 and in prose it is impossible not to be struck with the 
 energy which it produces. Brougham's passage is excel- 
 lent in its way ; but it pales before the flashing lights of 
 Burke's sentences." * 
 
 But though the beauties of Burke's style are the beau- 
 ties of poetry, his prose is a true prose, and has the ex- 
 cellences of prose. There is no need to dwell upon the 
 means by which Burke perfects the sequence of sentences 
 and paragraphs, or the nice ratio between theme and am- 
 plification, or the variety and force of his phrases, or the 
 accuracy and vigor of his vocabulary. These things are 
 self-evident. It may be well however to touch upon one 
 virtue of his prose language, which is possessed in equal 
 perfection by few orators. I mean his ingenuity in 
 neatly expressing what would naturally have been con- 
 sidered inexpressible except in many and perhaps awk- 
 ward words. I will cite several examples of this skilful 
 compression, though they lose their keenest point when 
 isolated : " Considering force not as an odious, but a 
 feeble instrument" (§31); "Terror is not always the 
 effect of force, and an armament is not a victory " 
 (§ 33) > " Will it not teach them that the government 
 against which a claim of liberty is tantamount to high 
 treason is a government to which submission is equivalent 
 to slavery?" (§ 60); "But courts incommodiously sit- 
 uated in effect deny justice ; and a court partaking in 
 the fruits of its own condemnation is a robber" (§ 116). 
 
 To be convinced with a discouraging degree of 
 thoroughness that these passages are not thrown off by 
 
 1 Payne's comment, Burke's Select Works y I., xl. 
 
xxxviii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 an average literary gift, one need but attempt to para- 
 phrase them in their various contexts. Yet Burke seeks 
 neither this virtue nor any of the more ornate habits of 
 expression in a spirit of pedantry. Every element of his 
 style seems to have come at the call of his general pur- 
 pose, — a purpose, not in itself literary, but voicing itself 
 through the operation of literary genius in extraordinary 
 beauty and vigor of style. 
 
 The student's total impression of Burke's English is 
 that it not only serves the orator's conscious purpose, 
 furthering with sincerity and vividness the granting of 
 constitutional freedom to America ; it will be felt that to 
 the furthest limit of thought or imagination, — of exposi- 
 tion, enforcement, summary, refutation, of description, 
 illustration, or appeal, — the subserviency of his style is 
 perfect and unconscious. It is part of the man. It is as 
 supple as the Arab horse to his master's hand ; and like 
 that, while it obeys, it carries him on to where new obe- 
 dience is exacted. Burke habitually relies upon the cer- 
 tainty with which the right words will appear and fall 
 harmoniously into their right places. To share in the 
 satisfactions of that confidence is fully to enjoy the style 
 of Burke, and enjoyment of Burke's style is by no means 
 the least important end to which work on this oration 
 should contribute. 
 
A CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE 
 
 COVERING THE LIFE OF BURKE AND SUCH HISTORY AND 
 LITERATURE AS BEAR SPECIAL RELATION TO HIS LIFE- 
 WORK OR TO HIS SPEECH ON CONCILIATION. 
 
 1 651-1663. Various Navigation Acts, limiting Ameri- 
 can carrying-trade. 
 
 1672-1764. Other Trade Laws, damaging to colonial 
 commerce or manufactures. 
 1729. Burke born in Dublin. 
 
 1748. Graduated from Trinity College, Dublin. 
 
 1 749. Bolingbroke : Idea of a Patriot King. 
 Montesquieu : Esprit des Lois. 
 
 1750. Burke arrived in London. 
 
 1754. Mutiny Act extended to the Colonies. 
 
 1755. French and Indian War. 
 
 1756. Vindication of Natural Society. 
 Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful. 
 Burke married to Jane Nugent. 
 
 1 757. Supremacy of English Power in India. 
 Account of European Settlements in 
 
 America. 
 Abridgeme?tt of the History of England. 
 
 1758. Richard Burke born. 
 
 1759. Capture of Quebec. 
 Annual Register, Vol. I. 
 Burke Secretary to Hamilton. 
 
xl A CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 1760. Accession of George Third. 
 
 1 761. Burke in Ireland. 
 
 Blow struck at colonial judiciary. 
 
 1762. Whiteboy outbreak. 
 Rousseau : Contrat Social. 
 
 1763. Grenville Ministry. 
 Peace of Paris. 
 
 1 764. Burke a Member of " The Club." 
 Sugar Tax. 
 
 1765. Stamp Act. 
 Rockingham Ministry. 
 
 Burke Secretary to Rockingham. 
 Enters Parliament from Wendover. 
 Colonial Congress, at New York. 
 Blackstone : Commentaries. 
 
 1766. Repeal of Stamp Act. 
 Chatham Ministry. 
 Lessing : Laocoon. 
 
 1767. Grafton Ministry. 
 
 1768. Burke purchases Beaconsfield. 
 
 1769. Tea Tax affirmed. 
 Transportation Act affirmed. 
 Junius : first Letter. 
 
 Observations on the present State of the Nation. 
 
 1770. Thoughts on the Cause of the Present Dis- 
 
 contents. 
 Boston Massacre. 
 North Ministry. 
 
 1 77 1. Burke Agent for New York. 
 Parliamentary Debates reported. 
 
 1773. Boston Tea Party. 
 Burke visits France. 
 
A CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. xli 
 
 1774. Speech on American Taxation. 
 Burke member for Bristol. 
 Boston Port Bill. 
 
 Act for trial of British Soldiers. 
 Abrogation of Charter of Massachusetts. 
 First Continental Congress at Philadelphia. 
 Colonial Militia organized. 
 Tucker : The Trice Interest of Britain. 
 
 1775. ''Penal Bill" introduced by Lord North, 
 
 Feb. 10. 
 
 "Project" introduced by Lord North, Feb. 27. 
 
 Johnson : Taxation no Tyranny. 
 
 Penal Bill passed by the Lords, Mar. 21. 
 
 Speech on Conciliation, Mar. 22. 
 
 Battles of Lexington and Concord. 
 
 Penal Bill passed, May 8. 
 
 Continental Congress rejects Lord North's proj- 
 ect, May 10. 
 
 Battle of Bunker Hill. 
 
 1776. Declaration of Independence. 
 Paine : Common Sense. 
 
 Smith : The Wealth of Nations. 
 
 1777. Address to the King. 
 
 Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol. 
 Surrender of Burgoyne. 
 
 1780. Speech on Economical Reform. 
 Lord George Gordon Riots. 
 
 1 78 1. Burke Member for Malton. 
 Surrender of Cornwallis. 
 
 1782. Second Rockingham Ministry. 
 Burke Paymaster of the Forces. 
 Shelburne Ministry. 
 
xlii A CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 
 
 1783. Coalition Ministry. 
 Speech on the India Bill. 
 
 1784. Pitt Ministry. 
 
 1785. Speech on the Nabob of Arcot 's Debts. 
 
 1786. Opening of the Trial of Hastings. 
 
 1789. French Revolution. 
 Washington's Administration. 
 
 1790. Reflections on the French Revolution. 
 
 1 791. Alienation of Burke from his friends. 
 
 Letter to a member of the National Assembly. 
 Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs. 
 Thoughts on French Affairs. 
 
 1792. Paine: Rights of Man. 
 Paine : Age of Reason. 
 
 1 793. Observations on the Conduct of the Ministry. 
 Execution of Louis Sixteenth. 
 
 Reign of Terror. 
 
 France declares War against Holland, Spain and 
 
 England. 
 Remarks on the Policy of the Allies. 
 
 1794. Bonaparte drives the British from Toulon. 
 Close of the trial of Hastings. 
 
 Burke retires from Parliament. 
 Richard Burke dies. 
 
 1795. Thoughts and Details on Scarcity. 
 Letter to a Noble Lord. 
 
 1796. Letters o?i a Regicide Peace. 
 
 1 797. John Adams's Administration. 
 Burke dies. 
 
 1809. Mrs. Burke dies. 
 
SPEECH 
 
 OF 
 
 EDMUND BURKE, ESQ. 
 
 ON 
 
 Moving his Resolutions 
 
 FOR 
 
 Conciliation with the Colonies 
 
 March 22, 1775 
 
 THE SECOND EDITION 
 
 LONDON 
 PRINTED FOR J. DODSLEY, IN PALL-MALL 
 
 MDCCLXXV 
 
SPEECH 
 
 ON 
 
 CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA 
 
 /. I hope, Sir, that notwithstanding the austerity of 
 the Chair, your good nature will incline you to some de- 
 gree of indulgence towards human frailty. You will not 
 think it unnatural that those who have an object depend- 
 5 ing which strongly engages their hopes and fears should 
 be somewhat inclined to superstition. As I came into 
 the House, full of anxiety about the event of my motion, 
 I found, to my infinite surprise, that the grand penal bill 
 by which we had passed sentence on the trade and sus- 
 
 10 tenance of America is to be returned to us from the other 
 House. I do confess, I could not help looking on this 
 event as a fortunate omen. I look upon it as a sort of 
 providential favor by which we are put once more in pos- 
 session of our deliberative capacity, upon a business so very 
 
 15 questionable in its nature, so very uncertain in its issue. 
 By the return of this bill, which seemed to have taken its 
 flight forever, we are at this very instant nearly as free to 
 choose a plan for our American government as we were 
 on the first day of the session. If, Sir, we incline to the 
 
 20 side of conciliation, Ave are not at all embarrassed (unless 
 we please to make ourselves so) by any incongruous mix- 
 ture of coercion and r^raint. We are therefore called 
 upon, as it were by a superior warning voice, again to 
 
 1 
 
2 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 attend to America ; to attend to the whole of it together ; 
 and to review the subject with an unusual degree of care 
 and calmness. 
 
 2. Surely it is an awful subject, or there is none so 
 on this side of the grave. When I first had the honor of 5 
 a seat in this House, the affairs of that continent pressed 
 themselves upon us as the most important and most deli- 
 cate object of parliamentary attention. My little share in 
 this great deliberation oppressed me. I found myself a 
 partaker in a very high trust ; and having no sort of 10 
 reason to rely on the strength of my natural abilities for 
 the proper execution of that trust, I was obliged to take 
 more than common pains to instruct myself in everything 
 which relates to our colonies. I was not less under the 
 necessity of forming some fixed ideas concerning the gen- 15 
 eral policy of the British Empire. Something of this sort 
 seemed to be indispensable, in order, amidst so vast a 
 fluctuation of passions and opinions, to concentre my 
 thoughts, to ballast my conduct, to preserve me from be- 
 ing blown about by every wind of fashionable doctrine. 20 
 I really did not think it safe or manly to have fresh prin- 
 ciples to seek upon every fresh mail which should arrive 
 from America. 
 
 3. At that period I had the fortune to find myself in 
 perfect concurrence with a large majority in this House. 25 
 Bowing under that high authority, and penetrated with 
 the sharpness and strength of that early impression, I 
 have continued ever since, without the least deviation, in 
 my original sentiments. Whether this be owing to an 
 obstinate perseverance in error, or to a religious adher- 30 
 ence to what appears to me truth and reason, it is in your 
 equity to judge. 
 
I 
 
 THE CRISIS. 
 
 I 4. Sir, Parliament having an enlarged view of ob- 
 jects, made, during this interval, more frequent changes 
 in their sentiments and their conduct than could be justi- 
 fied in a particular person upon the contracted scale of 
 5 private information. But though I do not hazard any- 
 thing approaching to a censure on the motives of former 
 Parliaments to all those alterations, one fact is undoubted, 
 —that under them the state of America has been kept in 
 continual agitation. Everything administered as remedy 
 
 10 to the public complaint, if it did not produce, was at least 
 followed by, an heightening of the distemper ; until by a 
 variety of experiments that important country has been 
 brought into her present situation — a situation which I 
 will not miscall, which I dare not name, which I scarcely 
 
 15 know how to comprehend in the terms of any de- 
 scription. 
 
 5. In this posture, Sir, things stood at the beginning 
 of the session. About that time a worthy member, of 
 great parliamentary experience, who in the year 1766 
 
 20 filled the Chair of the American Committee with much 
 ability, took me aside and, lamenting the present aspect 
 of our politics, told me things were come to such a pass 
 that our former methods of proceeding in the House 
 would be no longer tolerated ; that the public tribunal 
 
 25 (never too indulgent to a long and unsuccessful opposi- 
 tion) would now scrutinize our conduct with unusual 
 severity ; that the very vicissitudes and shiftings of min- 
 isterial measures, instead of convicting their authors of 
 inconstancy and want of system, would be taken as an 
 
 30 occasion of charging us with a predetermined discontent 
 which nothing could satisfy, whilst we accused every 
 measure of vigor as cruel, and every proposal of lenity as 
 
4 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 weak and irresolute. The public, he said, would not 
 have patience to see us play the game out with our ad- 
 versaries ; we must produce our hand : it would be ex- 
 pected that those who for many years had been active in 
 such affairs should show that they had formed some clear 5 
 and decided idea of the principles of colony government ; 
 and were capable of drawing out something like a plat- 
 form of the ground which might be laid for future and 
 permanent tranquillity. 
 
 6. I felt the truth of what my honorable friend repre- 10 
 sented ; but I felt my situation too. His application 
 might have been made with far greater propriety to many 
 other gentlemen. No man was indeed ever better dis- 
 posed, or worse qualified, for such an undertaking than 
 myself. Though I gave so far into his opinion that I im- 15 
 mediately threw my thoughts into a sort of parliamentary 
 form, I was by no means equally ready to produce them. 
 
 It generally argues some degree of natural impotence of 
 mind, or some want of knowledge of the world, to hazard 
 plans of government, except from a seat of authority. 20 
 Propositions are made, not only ineffectually, but some- 
 what disreputably, when the minds of men are not prop- 
 erly disposed for their reception ; and for my part, I am 
 not ambitious of ridicule, not absolutely a candidate for 
 disgrace. 25 
 
 7. Besides, Sir, to speak the plain truth, I have in 
 general no very exalted opinion of the virtue of paper 
 government, nor of any politics in which the plan is to 
 be wholly separated from the execution. But when I 
 saw that auger and violence prevailed every day more 30 
 and more, and that things were hastening towards an 
 incurable alienation of our colonies, I confess my caution 
 
BURKE'S PROPOSITION. 5 
 
 gave way. I felt this as one of those few moments in 
 which decorum yields to a higher duty. Public calamity 
 is a mighty leveller ; and there are occasions when any, 
 even the slightest, chance of doing good must be laid 
 
 5 hold on, even by the most inconsiderable person. 
 
 8. To restore order and repose to an empire so great 
 and so distracted as ours, is, merely in the attempt, an under- 
 taking that would ennoble the flights of the highest genius 
 and obtain pardon for the efforts of the meanest under- 
 
 10 standing. Struggling a good while with these thoughts, 
 by degrees I felt myself more firm. I derived, at length, 
 some confidence from what in other circumstances usually 
 produces timidity. I grew less anxious, even from the 
 idea of my own insignificance. For judging of what you 
 
 15 are by what you ought to be, I persuaded myself that you 
 would not reject a reasonable proposition, because it had 
 nothing but its reason to recommend it. On the other 
 hand, being totally destitute of all shadow of influence, 
 natural or adventitious, I was very sure that if my 
 
 20 proposition were futile or dangerous, if it were weakly 
 conceived or improperly timed, there was nothing exterior 
 to it, of power to awe, dazzle or delude you. You 
 will see it just as it is, and you will treat it just as it 
 deserves. 
 
 25 9. The proposition is peace. Not peace through 
 the medium of war ; not peace to be hunted through the 
 labyrinth of intricate and endless negotiations ; not peace 
 to arise out of universal discord fomented from principle 
 in all parts of the empire ; not peace to depend on the 
 
 30 juridical determination of perplexing questions, or the 
 precise marking the shadowy boundaries of a complex 
 It is simple peace, sought in its natural 
 
6 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 course and in its ordinary haunts. It is peace sought in 
 the spirit of peace, and laid in principles purely pacific. 
 I propose, by removing the ground of the difference, and 
 by restoring the former unsuspecting co7ifidence of the 
 colonies in the mother country, to give permanent satis- 5 
 faction to your people ; and (far from a scheme of ruling 
 by discord) to reconcile them to each other in the same 
 act and by the bond of the very same interest which 
 reconciles them to British government. 
 
 10. My idea is nothing more. Refined policy ever 10 
 has been the parent of confusion ; and ever will be so, as 
 long as the world endures. Plain good intention, which 
 is as easily discovered at the first view as fraud is surely 
 detected at last, is, let me say, of no mean force in the 
 government of mankind. Genuine simplicity of heart is 15 
 an healing and cementing principle. My plan, there- 
 fore, being formed upon the most simple grounds 
 imaginable, may disappoint some people when they hear 
 it. It has nothing to recommend it to the pruriency of 
 curious ears. There is nothing at all new and captivat- 20 
 ing in it. It has nothing of the splendor of the project 
 which has been lately laid upon your table by the noble 
 lord in the blue ribbon. It does not propose to fill your 
 lobby with squabbling colony agents, who will require 
 the interposition of your mace at every instant to keep 25 
 the peace amongst them. It does not institute a mag- 
 nificent auction of finance, where captivated provinces 
 come to general ransom by bidding against each other, 
 until you knock down the hammer, and determine a 
 proportion of payments beyond all the powers of algebra 30 
 to equalize and settle. 
 
 //. The plan which I shall presume to suggest 
 
ALL DESIRE CONCILIATION. 7 
 
 derives, however, one great advantage from the propo- 
 sition and registry of that noble lord's project. The 
 idea of conciliation is admissible. First, the House in 
 accepting the resolution moved by the noble lord has 
 5 admitted, notwithstanding the menacing front of our 
 address, notwithstanding our heavy bill of pains and 
 penalties, that we do not think ourselves precluded from 
 all ideas of free grace and bounty. 
 
 12. The House has gone farther : it has declared 
 
 10 conciliation admissible, previous to any submission on 
 the part of America. It has even shot a good deal 
 beyond that mark, and has admitted that the complaints 
 of our former mode of exerting the right of taxation were 
 not wholly unfounded. That right thus exerted is 
 
 15 allowed to have something reprehensible in it, something 
 unwise or something grievous ; since, in the midst of our 
 heat and resentment, we "of ourselves have proposed a 
 capital alteration ; and, in order to get rid of what 
 seemed so very exceptionable, have instituted a mode 
 
 20 that is altogether new, — one that is, indeed, wholly 
 alien from all the ancient methods and forms of Par- 
 liament. 
 
 I j. The principle of this proceeding is large enough 
 for my purpose. The means proposed by the noble lord 
 
 25 for carrying his ideas into execution, I think, indeed, are 
 very indifferently suited to the end ; and this I shall 
 endeavor to show you before I sit down. But, for the 
 present, I take my ground on the admitted principle. I 
 mean to give peace. Peace implies reconciliation ; and 
 
 30 where there has been a material dispute, reconciliation 
 does in a manner always imply concession on the one 
 part or on the o f her. In this state of things I make ng 
 
8 ON CONCILIA TION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 difficulty in affirming that the proposal ought to originate 
 from us. Great and acknowledged force is not impaired, 
 either in effect or in opinion, by an unwillingness to 
 exert itself. The superior power may offer peace with 
 honor and with safety. Such an offer from such a power 5 
 will be attributed to magnanimity. But the concessions 
 of the weak are the concessions of fear. When such a 
 one is disarmed, he is wholly at the mercy of his superior ; 
 and he loses forever that time and those chances which, 
 as they happen to all men, are the strength and resources 10 
 of all inferior power. 
 
 14. The capital leading questions on which you must 
 this day decide are these two : first, whether you ought 
 to concede; and secondly, what your concession ought 
 to be. On the first of these questions we have gained 15 
 (as I have just taken the liberty of observing to you) 
 some ground. But I am sensible that a good deal more 
 is still to be done. Indeed, Sir, to enable us to deter- 
 mine both on the one and the other of these great ques- 
 tions with a firm and precise judgment, I think it may be 20 
 necessary to consider distinctly the true nature and the 
 peculiar circumstances of the object which we have be- 
 fore us : because after all our struggle, whether we will 
 or not, we must govern America according to that nature 
 and to those circumstances, and not according to our 25 
 own imaginations, not according to abstract ideas of 
 right ; by no means according to mere general theories 
 of government, the resort to which appears to me in our 
 present situation no better than arrant trifling. I shall 
 therefore endeavor, with your leave, to lay before you 30 
 some of the most material of these circumstances in as 
 full and as clear a manner as I am able to state them. 
 
THE POPULATION OF AMERICA. g 
 
 75. The first thing that we have to consider with re- 
 gard to the nature of the object is the number of people 
 in the colonies. I have taken for some years a good 
 deal of pains on that point. I can by no calculation 
 
 5 justify myself in placing the number below two millions 
 of inhabitants of our own European blood and color ; 
 besides at least 500,000 others, who form no inconsider- 
 able part of the strength and opulence of the whole. 
 This, Sir, is, I believe, about the true number. There 
 
 10 is no occasion to exaggerate where plain truth is of so 
 much weight and importance. But whether I put the 
 present numbers too high or too low is a matter of little 
 moment. Such is the strength with which population 
 shoots in that part of the world, that, state the numbers 
 
 15 as high as we will, whilst the dispute continues, the ex- 
 aggeration ends. Whilst we are discussing any given 
 magnitude, they are grown to it. Whilst we spend our 
 time in deliberating on the mode of governing two mil- 
 lions, we shall find we have millions more to manage. 
 
 20 Your children do not grow faster from infancy to man- 
 hood, than they spread from families to communities, and 
 from villages to nations. 
 
 16. I put this consideration of the present and the 
 growing numbers in the front of our deliberation; be- 
 
 25 cause, Sir, this consideration will make it evident to a 
 blunter discernment than yours, that no partial, narrow, 
 contracted, pinched, occasional system will be at all suit- 
 able to such an object. It will show you that it is not 
 to be considered as one of those minima which are out 
 
 30 of the eye and consideration of the law ; not a paltry 
 excrescence of the state ; not a mean dependent, who 
 may be neglected with little damage and provoked with 
 
io ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 little danger. It will prove that some degree of care and 
 caution is required in the handling such an object; it 
 will show that you ought not, in reason, to trifle with so 
 large a mass of the interests and feelings of the human 
 race. You could at no time do so without guilt ; and 5 
 be assured you will not be able to do it long with im- 
 punity. 
 
 iy. But the population of this country, the great 
 and growing population, though a very important con- 
 sideration, will lose much of its weight, if not combined 10 
 with other circumstances. The commerce of your colo- 
 nies is out of all proportion beyond the numbers of the 
 people. This ground of their commerce, indeed, has 
 been trod some days ago, and with great ability, by a 
 distinguished person at your bar. This gentleman, after 15 
 thirty-five years, — it is so long since he first appeared at 
 the same place to plead for the commerce of Great 
 Britain, — has come again before you to plead the same 
 cause, without any other effect of time than that to the 
 fire of imagination and extent of erudition, which even 20 
 then marked him as one of the first literary characters 
 of his age, he has added a consummate knowledge in 
 the commercial interest of his country, formed by a 
 long course of enlightened and discriminating experi- 
 ence. 25 
 
 18. Sir, I should be inexcusable in coming after such 
 a person with any detail, if a great part of the members 
 who now fill the House had not the misfortune to be 
 absent when he appeared at your bar. Besides, Sir, I 
 propose to take the matter at periods of time somewhat 30 
 different from his. There is, if I mistake not, a point of 
 view from whence, if you will look at this subject, it is 
 
THE COMMERCE OF AMERICA. II 
 
 impossible that it should not make an impression upon 
 you. 
 
 ig. I have in my hand two accounts : one a com- 
 parative state of the export trade of England to its colo- 
 5 nies, as it stood in the year 1704, and as it stood in the 
 year 1772; the other a state of the export trade of this 
 country to its colonies alone, as it stood in 1772, com- 
 pared with the whole trade of England to all parts of the 
 world (the colonies included) in the year 1704. They 
 
 10 are from good vouchers ; the latter period from the ac- 
 counts on your table, the earlier from an original manu- 
 script of Davenant, who first established the Inspector- 
 General's office, which has been ever since his time so 
 abundant a source of parliamentary information. 
 
 15 20. The export trade to the colonies consists of three 
 great branches : the African, which, terminating almost 
 wholly in the colonies, must be put to the account of their 
 commerce ; the West Indian ; and the North American. 
 All these are so interwoven that the attempt to separate 
 
 20 them would tear to pieces the contexture of the whole ; 
 and, if not entirely destroy, would very much de- 
 preciate the value of all the parts. I therefore consider 
 these three denominations to be, what in effect they are, 
 one trade. 
 
 25 21. The trade to the colonies, taken on the export side, 
 at the beginning of this century, that is, in the year 1 704, 
 stood thus : — 
 
 Exports to North America and the West Indies, ^483,265 
 To Africa 86,665 
 
 30 ^5 6 9»93° 
 
 22. In the year 1772, which I take as a middle year 
 
12 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 between the highest and lowest of those lately laid on 
 your table, the account was as follows : — 
 
 To North America and the West Indies . . ^4,791,734 
 
 To Africa 866,398 
 
 To which if you add the export trade from c 
 
 Scotland, which had in 1704 no existence 364,000 
 
 ,£6,022,132 
 
 2J. From five hundred and odd thousand it has 
 grown to six millions. It has increased no less than 
 twelvefold. This is the state of the colony trade, as 10 
 compared with itself at these two periods within this 
 century ; and this is matter for meditation. But this is 
 not all. Examine my second account. See how the ex- 
 port trade to the colonies alone in 1772 stood in the other 
 point of view, that is, as compared to the whole trade of 15 
 England in 1704: — 
 
 The whole export trade of England, including 
 
 that to the colonies, in 1704 ,£6,509,000 
 
 Export to the colonies alone in 1772 . . . 6,024,000 
 
 Difference .... ^485,000 20 
 
 24. The trade with America alone is now within less 
 than ^500,000 of being equal to what this great com- 
 mercial nation, England, carried on at the beginning of 
 this century with the whole world ! If I had taken the 
 largest year of those on your table, it would rather have 25 
 exceeded. But, it will be said, is not this American 
 trade an unnatural protuberance that has drawn the juices 
 from the rest of the body ? The reverse. It is the very 
 food that has nourished every other part into its present 
 magnitude. Our general trade has been greatly aug- 30 
 
RAPID COMMERCIAL GROWTH. 1 3 
 
 mented, and augmented more or less in almost every 
 part to which it ever extended, but with this material 
 difference, that of the six millions which in the be- 
 ginning of the century constituted the whole mass of our 
 5 export commerce, the colony trade was but one-twelfth 
 part ; it is now (as a part of sixteen millions) consider- 
 ably more than a third of the whole. This is the relative 
 proportion of the importance of the colonies at these two 
 periods : and all reasoning concerning our mode of treat- 
 
 10 ing them must have this proportion as its basis \ or it is a 
 reasoning weak, rotten and sophistical. c^-^oox^wL 
 
 25. Mr. Speaker, I cannot prevail on myself to hurry 
 over this great consideration. It is good for us to be 
 here. We stand where we have an immense view of 
 
 15 what is, and what is past. Clouds, indeed, and dark- 
 ness rest upon the future. Let us, however, before we 
 descend from this noble eminence, reflect that this growth 
 of our national prosperity has happened within the short 
 period of the life of man. It has happened within sixty- 
 
 20 eight years. There are those alive whose memory might 
 touch the two extremities. For instance, my Lord 
 Bathurst might remember all the stages of the progress. 
 He was in 1 704 of an age at least to be made to com- 
 prehend such things. He was then old enough acta 
 
 25 parentum jam legere, et quae sit poterit cognoscere 
 virtus. Suppose, Sir, that the angel of this auspicious 
 youth, foreseeing the many virtues which made him one 
 of the most amiable, as he is one of the most fortunate, 
 men of his age, had opened to him in vision, that when 
 
 30 in the fourth generation the third prince of the House of 
 Brunswick had sat twelve years on the throne of that na- 
 tion which (by the happy issue of moderate and healing 
 
14 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 counsels) was to be made Great Britain, he should see his 
 son, Lord Chancellor of England, turn back the current 
 of hereditary dignity to its fountain, and raise him to a 
 higher rank of peerage, whilst he enriched the family 
 with a new one ; — if amidst these bright and happy 5 
 scenes of domestic honor and prosperity that angel should 
 have drawn up the curtain and unfolded the rising glories 
 of his country, and, whilst he was gazing with admira- 
 tion on the then commercial grandeur of England, the 
 genius should point out to him a little speck, scarcely 10 
 visible in the mass of the national interest, a small 
 seminal principle rather than a formed body, and should 
 tell him, — " Young man, there is America, which at this 
 day serves for little more than to amuse you with stories 
 of savage men and uncouth manners ; yet shall, before 15 
 you taste of death, show itself equal to the whole of that 
 commerce which now attracts the envy of the world. 
 Whatever England has been growing to by a progressive 
 increase of improvement, brought in by varieties of peo- 
 ple, by succession of civilizing conquests and civilizing 20 
 settlements in a series of seventeen hundred years, you 
 shall see as much added to her by America in the course 
 of a single life ! " If this state of his country had been 
 foretold to him, would it not require all the sanguine 
 cj^dulity of youth and all the fervid glow of enthusiasm 25 
 to make him believe it ? Fortunate man, he has lived to 
 see it ! Fortunate indeed, if he lives to see nothing that 
 shall vary the prospect and cloud the setting of his day ! 
 26. Excuse me, Sir, if, turning from such thoughts, I 
 resume this comparative view once more. You have seen 30 
 it on a large scale ; look at it on a small one. I will point 
 out to your attention a particular instance of it in the 
 
AMERICAN A GRICUL TURE. 15 
 
 single province of Pennsylvania. In the year 1704 that 
 province called for ^11,459 in value of your commodi- 
 ties, native and foreign. This was the whole. What did 
 it demand in 1772? Why, nearly fifty times as much; 
 5 for in that year the export to Pennsylvania was ,£507,909, 
 nearly equal to the export to all the colonies together in 
 the first period. 
 
 27. I choose, Sir, to enter into these minute and 
 particular details; because generalities, which in all 
 
 10 other cases are apt to heighten and raise the subject, have 
 here a tendency to sink it. When we speak of the com- 
 merce with our colonies, fiction lags after truth, invention 
 is unfruitful, and imagination cold and barren. 
 
 28. So far, Sir, as to the importance of the object in 
 15 the view of its commerce, as concerned in the exports 
 
 from England. If I were to detail the imports, I could 
 show how many enjoyments they procure which deceive 
 the burthen of life, how many materials which invigorate 
 the springs of national industry, and extend and animate 
 
 20 every part of our foreign and domestic commerce. This 
 would be a curious subject indeed, — but I must prescribe 
 bounds to myself in a matter so vast and various. 
 
 2Q. I pass, therefore, to the colonies in another point 
 of view, — their agriculture. This they have prosecuted 
 
 25 with such a spirit that, besides feeding plentifully their 
 own growing multitude, their annual export of grain, 
 comprehending rice, has some years ago exceeded a 
 million in value. Of their last harvest, I am persuaded, 
 they will export much more. At the beginning of the 
 
 30 century some of these colonies imported corn from the 
 mother country. For some time past the Old World has 
 been fed from the New. The scarcity which you have 
 
1 6 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 felt would have been a desolating famine, if this child 
 of your old age, with a true filial piety, with a Roman 
 charity, had not put the full breast of its youthful exu- 
 berance to the mouth of its exhausted parent. 
 
 JO. As to the wealth which the colonies have drawn 5 
 from the sea by their fisheries, you had all that matter 
 fully opened at your bar. You surely thought those 
 acquisitions of value, for they seemed even to excite your 
 envy ; and yet the spirit by which that enterprising em- 
 ployment has been exercised ought rather, in my opinion, 10 
 to have raised your esteem and admiration. And pray, 
 Sir, what in the world is equal to it ? Pass by the other 
 parts, and look at the manner in which the people of 
 New England have of late carried on the whale fishery. 
 Whilst we follow them among the tumbling mountains 15 
 of ice, and behold them penetrating into the deepest 
 frozen recesses of Hudson Bay and Davis Strait, whilst 
 we are looking for them beneath the Arctic Circle, we 
 hear that they have pierced into the opposite region of 
 polar cold, that they are at the antipodes and engaged 20 
 under the frozen Serpent of the south. Falkland Island, 
 which seemed too remote and romantic an object for the 
 grasp of national ambition, is but a stage and resting- 
 place in the progress of their victorious industry. Nor 
 is the equinoctial heat more discouraging to them than 25 
 the accumulated winter of both the poles. We know 
 that whilst some of them draw the line and strike the 
 harpoon on the coast of Africa, others run the longitude 
 and pursue their gigantic game along- the coast of Brazil. 
 No sea but what is vexed by their fisheries. No climate 30 
 that is not witness to their toils. Neither the persever- 
 ance of Holland nor the activity of France nor the 
 
AMERICAN FISHERIES. 17 
 
 dexterous and firm sagacity of English enterprise ever 
 carried this most perilous mode of hardy industry to the 
 extent to which it has been pushed by this recent people 
 — a people who are still, as it were, but in the gristle, 
 5 and not yet hardened into the bone of manhood. jWhen 
 I contemplate these things; when I know that the 
 colonies in general owe little or nothing to any care of 
 ours, and that they are not squeezed into this happy form 
 by the constraints of watchful and suspicious govern- . 
 
 10 ment, but that through a wise and salutary neglect a 
 generous nature has been suffered to take her own way to 
 perfection; — when I reflect upon these effects, when I 
 see how profitable they have been to us, I feel all the pride 
 of power sink, and all presumption in the wisdom of 
 
 15 human contrivances melt and die away within me. My 
 rigor relents. I pardon something to the spirit of 
 liberty, 
 
 (Al^fir. I am sensible, Sir, that all which I have asserted 
 in my detail is admitted in the gross, but that quite a 
 
 20 different conclusion is drawn from it. America, gentle- 
 men say, is a noble object ; it is an object well worth 
 fighting for. Certainly it is, if fighting a people be the 
 best way of gaining them. Gentlemen in this respect 
 will be led to their choice of means by their complexions 
 
 25 and their habits. Those who understand the military 
 art will of course have some predilection for it. Those 
 who wield the thunder of the state may have more con- 
 fidence in the efficacy of arms. But I confess, possibly 
 for want of this knowledge, my opinion is much more in 
 
 30 favor of prudent management than of force, — consider- 
 ing force not as an odious, but a feeble, instrument for 
 preserving a people so numerous, so active, so growing. 
 
18 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 so spirited as this, in a profitable and subordinate con- 
 nection with us. 
 $$> J2. First, Sir, permit me to observe that the use of 
 force alone is but temporary. It may subdue for a mo- 
 ment, but it does not remove the necessity of subduing 5 
 again ; and a nation is not governed which is perpetually 
 to be conquered. 
 
 j 1J33. My next objection is its uncertainty. Terror is 
 not always the effect of force ; and an armament is not a 
 victory. If you do not succeed, you are without re- 10 
 source : for conciliation failing, force remains ; but force 
 failing, no further hope of reconciliation is left. Power 
 and authority are sometimes bought by kindness; but 
 they can never be begged as alms by an impoverished 
 and defeated violence. 15 
 
 34. A further objection to force is that you impair the 
 object by your very endeavors to preserve it. The thing 
 you fought for is not the thing which you recover ; but 
 depreciated, sunk, wasted and consumed in the contest. 
 Nothing less will content me than whole America. I do 20 
 not choose to consume its strength along with our own ; 
 because in all parts it is the British strength that I con- 
 sume. I do not choose to be caught by a foreign enemy 
 at the end of this exhausting conflict ; and still less in 
 the midst of it. I may escape ; but I can make no in- 25 
 surance against such an event. Let me add that I do 
 not choose wholly to break the American spirit ; because 
 it is the spirit that has made the country. 
 
 J 0? 35. Lastly, we have no sort of experience in favor of 
 force as an instrument in the rule of our colonies. Their 30 
 growth and their utility have been owing to methods al- 
 together different. Our ancient indulgence has been said 
 
COL ONIAL LOVE OF L IBER TV. 19 
 
 to be pursued to a fault. It may be so ; but we know, if 
 feeling is evidence, that our fault was more tolerable than 
 our attempt to mend it, and our sin far more salutary 
 than our penitence. 
 5^j6. These, Sir, are my reasons for not entertaining 
 that high opinion of untried force, by which many gen- 
 tlemen, for whose sentiments in other particulars I have 
 great respect, seem to be so greatly captivated. But 
 there is still behind a third consideration concerning this 
 
 10 object, which serves to determine my opinion on the sort 
 of policy which ought to be pursued in the management 
 of America, even more than its population and its com- 
 merce : I mean its temper and character. 
 3 V 37. In this character of the Americans a love of 
 
 15 freedom is the predominating feature which marks and 
 distinguishes the whole : and as an ardent is always a 
 jealous affection, your colonies become suspicious, restive 
 and untractable, whenever they see the least attempt to 
 wrest from them by force or shuffle from them by chicane 
 
 20 what they think the only advantage worth living for. 
 This fierce spirit of liberty is stronger in the English 
 colonies probably than in any other people of the earth ; 
 and this from a great variety of powerful causes, which, 
 to understand the true temper of their minds and the 
 
 25 direction which this spirit takes, it will not be amiss to 
 lay open somewhat more largely. 
 
 ' y$. First, the people of the colonies are descendants 
 of Englishmen. England, Sir, is a nation which still, I 
 hope, respects, and formerly adored, her freedom. The 
 
 30 colonists emigrated from you when this part' of your char- 
 acter was most predominant ; and they took this bias and 
 direction the moment they parted from your hands. 
 
20 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 They are therefore not only devoted to liberty, but to 
 liberty according to English ideas and on English prin- 
 ciples. Abstract liberty, like other mere abstractions, is 
 not to be found. Liberty inheres in some sensible ob- 
 ject ; and every nation has formed to itself some favorite 5 
 point, which by way of eminence becomes the criterion 
 of their happiness. It happened, you know, Sir, that the 
 great contests for freedom in this country were from the 
 earliest times chiefly upon the question of taxing. Most 
 of the contests in the ancient commonwealths turned 10 
 primarily on the right of election of magistrates or on the 
 balance among the several orders of the state. The 
 question of money was not with them so immediate. But 
 in England it was otherwise. On this point of taxes the 
 ablest pens and most eloquent tongues have been exer- 15 
 cised, the greatest spirits have acted and suffered. In 
 order to give the fullest satisfaction concerning the im- 
 portance of this point, it was not only necessary for those 
 who in argument defended the excellence of the English 
 Constitution to insist on this privilege of granting money 20 
 as a dry point of fact, and to prove that the right had 
 been acknowledged in ancient parchments and blind 
 usages to reside in a certain body called a House of Com- 
 mons. They went much further : they attempted to 
 prove, and they succeeded, that in theory it ought to be 25 
 so, from the particular nature of the House of Commons 
 as an immediate representative of the people, whether the 
 old records had delivered this oracle or not. They took 
 infinite pains to inculcate as a fundamental principle, that 
 in all monarchies the people must in effect themselves, 30 
 mediately or immediately, possess the power of granting 
 their own money, or no shadow of liberty could subsist, 
 
 1 
 
SELF-TAXATION THE ENGLISH TEST. 21 
 
 The colonies draw from you, as with their life-blood, 
 these ideas and principles. Their love of liberty, as with 
 you, fixed and attached on this specific point of taxing. 
 Liberty might be safe or might be endangered in twenty 
 5 other particulars without their being much pleased or 
 alarmed. Here they felt its pulse ; and as they found 
 that beat, they thought themselves sick or sound. I do 
 not say whether they were right or wrong in applying 
 your general arguments to their own case. It is not 
 
 10 easy, indeed, to make a monopoly of theorems and corol- 
 laries. The fact is that they did thus apply those general 
 arguments ; and your mode of governing them, whether 
 through lenity or indolence, through wisdom or mistake, 
 confirmed them in the imagination that they, as well as 
 
 15 you, had an interest in these common principles. 
 t/u"5#- They were further confirmed in this pleasing 
 error by the form of their provincial legislative assem- 
 blies. Their governments are popular in an high degree : 
 some are merely popular ; in all the popular representa- 
 
 20 tive is the most weighty ; and this share of the people in 
 their ordinary government never fails to inspire them 
 with lofty sentiments and with a strong aversion from 
 whatever tends to deprive them of their chief impor- 
 tance. 
 
 25 4<p. If anything were wanting to this necessary 
 operation of the form of government, religion would 
 have given it a complete effect. Religion, always a 
 principle of energy, in this new people is no way worn 
 out or impaired ; and their mode of professing it is also 
 
 30 one main cause of this free spirit. The people are 
 Protestants, and of that kind which is the most adverse 
 to all implicit submission of mind and opinion. This is 
 
22 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 a persuasion not only favorable to liberty, but built upon 
 it. I do not think, Sir, that the reason of this averse- 
 ness in the dissenting churches from all that looks like 
 absolute government is so much to be sought in their re- 
 ligious tenets as in their history. Every one knows that 5 
 the Roman Catholic religion is at least coeval with most 
 of the governments where it prevails ; that it has gen- 
 erally gone hand in hand with them, and received great 
 favor and every kind of support from authority. The 
 Church of England too was formed from her cradle 10 
 under the nursing care of regular government. But the 
 dissenting interests have sprung up in direct opposition 
 to all the ordinary powers of the world, and could justify 
 that opposition only on a strong claim to natural liberty. 
 Their very existence depended on the powerful and un- 15 
 remitted assertion of that claim. All Protestantism, even 
 the most cold and passive, is a sort of dissent. But the 
 religion most prevalent in our northern colonies is a re- 
 finement on the principle of resistance : it is the dis- 
 sidence of dissent and the Protestantism of the Protestant 20 
 religion. This religion, under a variety of denomina- 
 tions agreeing in nothing but in the communion of the 
 spirit of liberty, is predominant in most of the northern 
 provinces, where the Church of England, notwithstand- 
 ing its legal rights, is in reality no more than a sort of 25 
 private sect, not composing most probably the tenth of 
 the people. The colonists left England when this spirit 
 was high, and in the emigrants was the highest of all ; 
 and even that stream of foreigners which has been con- 
 stantly flowing into these colonies has, for the greatest 30 
 part, been composed of dissenters from the establishments 
 of their several countries, and have brought with them a 
 
EFFECT OF SLAVE-HOLDING. 23 
 
 temper and character far from alien to that of the people 
 with whom they mixed. 
 
 4^L> Sir, I can perceive by their manner that some 
 gentlemen object to the latitude of this description, be- 
 
 5 cause in the southern colonies the Church of England 
 forms a large body and has a regular establishment. It 
 is certainly true. There is, however, a circumstance at- 
 tending these colonies, which, in my opinion, fully 
 counterbalances this difference and makes the spirit of 
 
 10 liberty still more high and haughty than in those to the 
 northward. It is, that in Virginia and the Carolinas 
 they have a vast multitude of slaves. Where this is the 
 case in any part of the world, those who are free are by 
 far the most proud and jealous of their freedom. Free- 
 
 15 dom is to them not only an enjoyment, but a kind of 
 rank and privilege. Not seeing there that freedom, as in 
 countries where it is a common blessing and as broad 
 and general as the air, may be united with much abject 
 toil, with great misery, with all the exterior of servitude, 
 
 20 liberty looks, amongst them, like something that is more 
 noble and liberal. I do not mean, Sir, to commend the 
 superior morality of this sentiment, which has at least as 
 much pride as virtue in it ; but I cannot alter the nature 
 of man. The fact is so ; and these people of the south - 
 
 25 ern colonies are much more strongly and with a higher 
 and more stubborn spirit attached to liberty than those 
 to the northward. Such were all the ancient common- 
 wealths ; such were our Gothic ancestors ; such in our 
 days were the Poles ; and such will be all masters of 
 
 30 slaves, who are not slaves themselves. In such a people 
 the haughtiness of domination combines with the spirit 
 of freedom, fortifies it, and renders it invincible. 
 
24 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 42. Permit me, Sir, to add another circumstance in 
 our colonies, which contributes no mean part towards 
 the growth and effect of this untractable spirit : I mean 
 their education. In no country perhaps in the world is 
 the law so general a study. The profession itself is 5 
 numerous and powerful, and in most provinces it takes 
 the lead. The greater number of the deputies sent to 
 the Congress were lawyers. But all who read (and most 
 do read) endeavor to obtain some smattering in that 
 science. I have been told by an eminent bookseller that 10 
 in no branch of his business, after tracts of popular 
 devotion, were so many books as those on the law ex- 
 ported to the plantations. The colonists have now fallen 
 into the way of printing them for their own use. I hear 
 that they have sold nearly as many of Blackstone's Com- 15 
 mentaries in America as in England. General Gage 
 marks out this disposition very particularly in a letter on 
 your table. He states that all the people in his govern- 
 ment are lawyers or smatterers in law ; and that in Bos- 
 ton they have been enabled by successful chicane wholly 20 
 to evade many parts of one of your capital penal con- 
 stitutions. The smartness of debate will say that this 
 knowledge ought to teach them more clearly the rights 
 of legislature, their obligations to obedience and the 
 penalties of rebellion. All this is mighty well. But my 25 
 honorable and learned friend on the floor, who con- 
 descends to mark what I say for animadversion, will dis- 
 dain that ground. He has heard, as well as I, that when 
 great honors and great emoluments do not win over this 
 knowledge to the service of the state, it is a formidable 30 
 adversary to government. If the spirit be not tamed and 
 broken by these happy methods, it is stubborn and 
 
REMOTENESS FROM ENGLAND. 2% 
 
 litigious. Abeunt studia in mores. This study renders 
 men acute, inquisitive, dexterous, prompt in attack, ready 
 in defence, full of resources. In other countries the 
 people, more simple and of a less mercurial cast, judge of 
 5 an ill principle in government only by an actual griev- 
 ance; here they anticipate the evil and judge of the 
 pressure of the grievance by the badness of the principle. 
 They augur misgovernment at a distance and snuff the 
 approach of tyranny in every tainted breeze. 
 10 43. The last cause of this disobedient spirit in the 
 colonies is hardly less powerful than the rest, as it is not 
 merely moral, but laid deep in the natural constitution 
 of things. Three thousand miles of ocean lie between 
 you and them. No contrivance can prevent the effect of 
 15 this distance in weakening government. Seas roll and 
 months pass between the order and the execution ; and 
 the want of a speedy explanation of a single point is 
 enough to defeat a whole system. You have, indeed, 
 winged ministers of vengeance, who carry your bolts in 
 20 their pounces to the remotest verge of the sea. But 
 there a power steps in that limits the arrogance of 
 raging passions and furious elements, and says, "So far 
 shalt thou go, and no farther." Who are you, that you 
 should fret and rage, and bite the chains of Nature? 
 25 Nothing worse happens to you than does to all nations who 
 have extensive empire ; and it happens in all the forms 
 into which empire can be thrown. In large bodies the 
 circulation of power must be less vigorous at the ex- 
 tremities. Nature has said it. The Turk cannot govern 
 30 Egypt and Arabia and Kurdistan as he governs Thrace ; 
 nor has he the same dominion in Crimea and Algiers 
 which he has at Brusa and Smyrna. Despotism itself is 
 
26 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 obliged to truck and huckster. The sultan gets such 
 obedience as he can. He governs with a loose rein, that 
 he may govern at all ; and the whole of the force and 
 vigor of his authority in his centre is derived from a 
 prudent relaxation in all his borders. Spain, in her 5 
 provinces, is perhaps not so well obeyed as you are in 
 yours. She complies too : she submits ; she watches 
 times. This is the immutable condition, the eternal law, 
 of extensive and detached empire. 
 
 44. Then, Sir, from these six capital sources : of de- 10 
 scent, of form of government, of religion in the northern 
 provinces, of manners in the southern, of education, of 
 the remoteness of situation from the first mover of gover- 
 nment, — from all these causes a fierce spirit of liberty has 
 grown up. It has grown with the growth of the people 15 
 in your colonies, and increased with the increase of their 
 wealth : a spirit, that unhappily meeting with an exercise 
 of power in England, which, however lawful, is not 
 reconcilable to any ideas of liberty, much less with 
 theirs, has kindled this flame that is ready to consume 20 
 us. 
 
 45". I do not mean to commend either the spirit in this 
 excess or the moral causes which produce it. Perhaps a 
 more smooth and accommodating spirit of freedom in 
 them would be more acceptable to us. Perhaps ideas of 25 
 liberty might be desired more reconcilable with an 
 arbitrary and boundless authority. Perhaps we might 
 wish the colonists to be persuaded that their liberty is 
 more secure when held in trust for them by us, as their 
 guardians during a perpetual minority, than with any 30 
 part of it in their own hands. The question is not 
 whether their spirit deserves praise or blame, but what, in 
 
WHAT SHALL BE DONE ? 27 
 
 the name of God, shall we do with it ? You have be- 
 fore you the object, such as it is, with all its glories, with 
 all its imperfections on its head. You see the magni- 
 tude, the importance, the temper, the habits, the dis- 
 5 orders. By all these considerations we are strongly 
 urged to determine something concerning it. We are 
 called upon to fix some rule and line for our future con- 
 duct, which may give a little stability to our politics and 
 prevent the return of such unhappy deliberations as the 
 
 10 present. Every such return will bring the matter before 
 us in a still more untractable form. For what astonish- 
 ing and incredible things have we not seen already ! 
 What monsters have not been generated from this unnat- 
 ural contention ! Whilst every principle of authority and 
 
 15 resistance has been pushed, upon both sides, as far as it 
 would go, there is nothing so solid and certain, either in 
 reasoning or in practice, that has not been shaken. Until 
 very lately all authority in America seemed to be nothing 
 but an emanation from yours. Even the popular part of 
 
 20 the colony constitution derived all its activity, and its first 
 vital movement, from the pleasure of the crown. We 
 thought, Sir, that the utmost which the discontented 
 colonists could do was to disturb authority; we never 
 dreamt they could of themselves supply it, knowing in 
 
 25 general what an operose business it is to establish a gov- 
 ernment absolutely new. But having for our purposes in 
 this contention resolved that none but an obedient as- 
 sembly should sit, the humors of the people there, finding 
 all passage through the legal channel stopped, with great 
 
 30 violence broke out another way. Some provinces have 
 tried their experiment, as we have tried ours ; and theirs 
 has succeeded. They have formed a government sum- 
 
28 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 cient for its purposes, without the bustle of a revolution 
 or the troublesome formality of an election. Evident 
 necessity and tacit consent have done the business in an 
 instant. So well they have done it, that Lord Dunmore 
 (the account is among the fragments on your table) tells 5 
 you that the new institution is infinitely better obeyed 
 than the ancient government ever was in its most fortu- 
 nate periods. Obedience is what makes government, and 
 not the names by which it is called : not the name of 
 governor, as formerly ; or committee, as at present. This 10 
 new government has originated directly from the people, 
 and was not transmitted through any of the ordinary 
 artificial media of a positive constitution. It was not a 
 manufacture ready formed, and transmitted to them in 
 that condition from England. The evil arising from 15 
 hence is this : that the colonists having once found the 
 possibility of enjoying the advantages of order in the 
 midst of a struggle for liberty, such struggles will not 
 henceforward seem so terrible to the settled and sober , 
 part of mankind, as they had appeared before the trial. 20 
 
 46. Pursuing the same plan of punishing by the 
 denial of the exercise of government to still greater 
 lengths, we wholly abrogated the ancient government of 
 Massachusetts. We were confident that the first feeling, 
 if not the very prospect of anarchy, would instantly en- 25 
 force a complete submission. The experiment was tried. 
 A new, strange, unexpected face of things appeared. 
 Anarchy is found tolerable. A vast province has now 
 subsisted, and subsisted in a considerable degree of 
 health and vigor, for near a twelvemonth, without 30 
 governor, without public council, without judges, without 
 executive magistrates. How long it will continue in this 
 
EXPERIMENTS IMPERIL ENGLAND. 29 
 
 state, or what may arise out of this unheard-of situation, 
 how can the wisest of us conjecture ? Our late experi- 
 ence has taught us that many of those fundamental 
 principles formerly believed infallible are either not of the 
 
 5 importance they were imagined to be, or that we have 
 not at all adverted to some other far more important and 
 far more powerful principles, which entirely overrule 
 those we had considered as omnipotent. I am much 
 against any further experiments which tend to put to the 
 
 10 proof any more of these allowed opinions which con- 
 tribute so much to the public tranquillity. In effect, we 
 suffer as much at home by this loosening of all ties and 
 this concussion of all established opinions, as we do 
 abroad. For, in order to prove that the Americans have 
 
 15 no right to their liberties, we are every day endeavoring 
 to subvert the maxims which preserve the whole spirit of 
 our own. To prove that Americans ought not to be free, 
 we are obliged to depreciate the value of freedom itself; 
 and we never seem to gain a paltry advantage over them 
 
 20 in debate, without attacking some of those principles, or 
 deriding some of those feelings, for which our ancestors 
 have shed their blood. 
 
 •J^ 4V. But, Sir, in wishing to put an end to pernicious 
 experiments, I do not mean to preclude the fullest 
 
 25 inquiry. Far from it. Far from deciding on a sudden 
 or partial view, I would patiently go round and round 
 the subject, and survey it minutely in every possible 
 aspect. Sir, if I were capable of engaging you to an 
 equal attention, I would state that, as far as I am capable 
 
 30 of discerning, there are but three ways of proceeding 
 relative to this stubborn spirit which prevails in your 
 colonies and disturbs your government. These are : to 
 
30 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 change that spirit as inconvenient, by removing the 
 causes ; to prosecute it as criminal ; or to comply with it 
 as necessary. I would not be guilty of an imperfect 
 enumeration ; I can think of but these three. Another 
 has indeed been started, that of giving up the colonies ; 5 
 but it met so slight a reception that I do not think 
 myself obliged to dwell a great while upon it. It is 
 nothing but a little sally of anger, like the frowardness 
 of peevish children, who, when they cannot get all they 
 would have, are resolved to take nothing. 10 
 
 jf8. The first of these plans, to change the spirit as 
 inconvenient, by removing the causes, I think is the 
 most like a systematic proceeding. It is radical in its 
 principle ; but it is attended with great difficulties, some 
 of them little short, as I conceive, of impossibilities. 15 
 This will appear by examining into the plans which have 
 been proposed. 
 
 ~> 49. As the growing population in the colonies is 
 ^ evidently one cause of their resistance, it was last session 
 mentioned in both Houses by men of weight, and 20 
 received not without applause, that in order to check 
 this evil, it would be proper for the crown to make no 
 further grants of land. But to this scheme there are two 
 objections. The first, that there is already so much 
 unsettled land in private hands as to afford room for an 25 
 immense future population, although the crown not only 
 withheld its grants, but annihilated its soil. If this be 
 the case, then the only effect of this avarice of desolation, 
 this hoarding of a royal wilderness, would be to raise the 
 value of the possessions in the hands of the great private 30 
 monopolists, without any adequate check to the growing 
 and alarming mischief of population. 
 
NATURE PLEADS FOR FREEDOM. 3* 
 
 / I 
 j>0. But if you stopped your grants, what would be 
 
 the consequence? The people would occupy without 
 
 grants. They have already so occupied in many places. 
 
 You cannot station garrisons in every part of these 
 
 5 deserts. If you drive the people from one place, they 
 will carry on their annual tillage and remove with their 
 flocks and herds to another. Many of the people in the 
 back settlements are already little attached to particular 
 situations. Already they have topped the Appalachian 
 
 10 Mountains. From thence they behold before them an 
 immense plain, one vast, rich, level meadow ; a square 
 of five hundred miles. Over this they would wander 
 without a possibility of restraint; they would change 
 their manners with the habits of their life ; would soon 
 
 15 forget a government by which they were disowned; 
 would become hordes of English Tartars, and pouring 
 down upon your unfortified frontiers a fierce and irre- 
 sistible cavalry, become masters of your governors and 
 your counsellors, your collectors and comptrollers, and 
 
 20 of all the slaves that adhered to them. Such would, and 
 in no long time must, be the effect of attempting to for- 
 bid as a crime, and to suppress as an evil, the command 
 and blessing of Providence, " Increase and multiply." 
 Such would be the happy result of an endeavor to keep 
 
 25 as a lair of wild beasts that earth which God, by an 
 express charter, has given to the children of men. Far 
 different and surely much wiser has been our policy 
 hitherto. Hitherto we have invited our people, by every 
 kind of bounty, to fixed establishments. We have 
 
 30 invited the husbandman to look to authority for his title. 
 We have taught him piously to believe in the mysterious 
 virtue of wax and parchment. We have thrown each 
 
32 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 tract of land, as it. was peopled, into districts, that the 
 ruling power should never be wholly out of sight. We 
 have settled all we could ; and we have carefully attended 
 every settlement with government. 
 
 37. Adhering, Sir, as I do, to this policy, as well as 5 
 for the reasons I have just given, I think this new pro- 
 ject of hedging-in population to be neither prudent nor 
 practicable. 
 
 52. To impoverish the colonies in general, and in 
 particular to arrest the noble course of their marine 10 
 enterprises, would be a more easy task. I freely confess 
 it. We have shown a disposition to a system of this 
 kind, — a disposition even to continue the restraint after 
 the offence, looking on ourselves as rivals to our colonies, 
 and persuaded that of course we must gain all that they 15 
 shall lose. Much mischief we may certainly do. The 
 power inadequate to all other things is often more than 
 sufficient for this. I do not look on the direct and 
 immediate power of the colonies to resist our violence as 
 very formidable. In this, however, I may be mistaken. 20 
 But when I consider that we have colonies for no pur- 
 pose but to be serviceable to us, it seems to my poor 
 understanding a little preposterous to make them un- 
 serviceable in order to keep them obedient. It is, in 
 truth, nothing more than the old and, as I thought, ex- 25 
 ploded problem of tyranny, which proposes to beggar its 
 subjects into submission. But remember, when you have 
 completed your system of impoverishment, that Nature 
 still proceeds in her ordinary course; that discontent 
 will increase with misery; and that there are critical 30 
 moments in the fortune of all states, when they who 
 are too weak to contribute to your prosperity may be 
 
CAN THEIR SPIRIT BE CHANGED ? 33 
 
 strong enough to complete your ruin. Spoliatis arma 
 supersunt. 
 
 53. The temper and character which prevail in our 
 colonies are, I am afraid, unalterable by any human art. 
 
 5 We cannot, I fear, falsify the pedigree of this fierce peo- 
 ple and persuade them that they are not sprung from a 
 nation in whose veins the blood of freedom circulates. 
 The language in which they would hear you tell them 
 this tale would detect the imposition ; your speech would 
 
 10 betray you. An Englishman is the unfittest person on 
 earth to argue another Englishman into slavery. 
 
 54. I think it is nearly as little in our power to change 
 their republican religion as their free descent, or to sub- 
 stitute the Roman Catholic as a penalty, or the Church 
 
 15 of England as an improvement, The mode of inquisi- 
 tion and dragooning is going out of fashion in the Old 
 World ; and I should not confide much to their efficacy 
 in the New. The education of the Americans is also on 
 the same unalterable bottom with their religion. You 
 
 20 cannot persuade them to burn their books of curious 
 science; to banish their lawyers from their courts of 
 laws ; or to quench the lights of their assemblies by re- 
 fusing to choose those persons who are best read in their 
 privileges. It would be no less impracticable to think 
 
 25 of wholly annihilating the popular assemblies in which 
 these lawyers sit. The army, by which we must govern 
 in their place, would be far more chargeable to us ; not 
 quite so effectual ; and perhaps in the end full as difficult 
 to be kept in obedience. 
 
 3° 55. With regard to the high aristocratic spirit of 
 Virginia and the southern colonies, it has been proposed, 
 I know, to reduce it by declaring a general enfranchise- 
 
34 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 ment of their slaves. This project has had its advo- 
 cates and panegyrists ; yet I never could argue myself 
 into any opinion of it. Slaves are often much attached 
 to their masters. A general wild offer of liberty would 
 not always be accepted. History furnishes few instances 
 of it. It is sometimes as hard to persuade slaves to be 
 free as it is to compel freemen to be slaves ; and in this 
 auspicious scheme we should have both these pleasing 
 tasks on our hands at once. But when we talk of en- 
 franchisement, do we not perceive that the American 10 
 master may enfranchise too, and arm servile hands in 
 defence of freedom ? — a measure to which other people 
 have had recourse more than once, and not without suc- 
 cess, in a desperate situation of their affairs. 
 
 56. Slaves as these unfortunate black people are, and 15 
 dull as all men are from slavery, must they not a little 
 suspect the offer of freedom from that very nation which 
 has sold them to their present masters ? from that nation, 
 one of whose causes of quarrel with those masters is their 
 refusal to deal any more in that inhuman traffic ? An 20 
 offer of freedom from England would come rather oddly, 
 shipped to them in an African vessel, which is refused an 
 entry into the ports of Virginia or Carolina, with a cargo 
 
 of three hundred Angola negroes. It would be curious 
 to see the Guinea captain attempting at the same instant 25 
 to publish his proclamation of liberty and to advertise 
 his sale of slaves. 
 
 57. But let us suppose all these moral difficulties got 
 over. The ocean remains. You cannot pump this dry ; 
 and as long as it continues in its present bed, so long all 30 
 the causes which weaken authority by distance will con- 
 tinue. 
 
CAN IT BE PROSECUTED AS CRIMINAL ? 35 
 
 Ye gods, annihilate but space and time, 
 And make two lovers happy ! 
 
 was a pious and passionate prayer, but just as reasonable 
 as many of the serious wishes of very grave and solemn 
 5 politicians. 
 
 58. '• If then, Sir, it seems almost desperate to think 
 of any alterative course for changing the moral causes 
 (and not quite easy to remove the natural) which pro- 
 duce prejudices irreconcilable to the late exercise of our 
 
 10 authority, but that the spirit infallibly will continue ; and 
 continuing, will produce such effects as now embarrass 
 us, — the second mode under consideration is to prosecute 
 that spirit in its overt acts as criminal. 
 
 59. At this proposition I must pause a moment. The 
 15 thing seems a great deal too big for my ideas of juris- 
 prudence. It should seem to my way of conceiving such 
 matters, that there is a very wide difference in reason and 
 policy between the mode of proceeding on the irregular 
 conduct of scattered individuals, or even of bands of 
 
 20 men, who disturb order within the state, and the civil 
 dissensions which may, from time to time, on great ques- 
 tions, agitate the several communities which compose a 
 great empire. It looks to me to be narrow and pedantic 
 to apply the ordinary ideas of criminal justice to this 
 
 25 great public contest. I do not know the method of 
 drawing up an indictment against a whole people. I 
 cannot insult and ridicule the feelings of millions of my 
 fellow-creatures, as Sir Edward Coke insulted one ex- 
 cellent individual (Sir Walter Raleigh) at the bar. I am 
 
 30 not ripe to pass sentence on the gravest public bodies, 
 entrusted with magistracies of great authority and dig- 
 nity, and charged with the safety of their fellow-citizens, 
 
36 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 upon the very same title that I am. I really think that 
 for wise men this is not judicious ; for sober men, not 
 decent ; for minds tinctured with humanity, not mild 
 and merciful. 
 
 60. Perhaps, Sir, I am mistaken in my idea of an 5 
 empire as distinguished from a single state or kingdom. 
 But my idea of it is this : that an empire is the aggregate 
 of many states under one common head, whether this 
 head be a monarch or a presiding republic. It does in 
 such constitutions frequently happen (and nothing but 10 
 the dismal, cold, dead uniformity of servitude can pre- 
 vent its happening) that the subordinate parts have many 
 local privileges and immunities. Between these privi- 
 leges and the supreme common authority the line may be 
 extremely nice. Of course disputes — often, too, very 15 
 bitter disputes — and much ill blood will arise. But 
 though every privilege is an exemption (in the case) from 
 the ordinary exercise of the supreme authority, it is no 
 denial of it. The claim of a privilege seems rather, ex 
 vi tennini, to imply a superior power ; for to talk of the 20 
 privileges of a state or of a person who has no superior, 
 is hardly any better than speaking nonsense. Now in 
 such unfortunate quarrels among the component parts of 
 a great political union of communities, I can scarcely 
 conceive anything more completely imprudent than for 25 
 the head of the empire to insist that, if any privilege is 
 pleaded against his will or his acts, [that] his whole au- 
 thority is denied ; instantly to proclaim rebellion, to beat 
 to arms, and to put the offending provinces under the 
 ban. Will not this, Sir, very soon teach the provinces 30 
 to make no distinctions on their part? Will it not teach 
 them that the government against which a claim of lib- 
 
PERILS OF CRIMINAL PROSECUTION. 
 
 37 
 
 erty is ta ntamou nt, to high treason is a government to 
 which submission is equivalent to slavery ? It may not 
 always be quite convenient to impress dependent com- 
 munities with such an idea. 
 5 67. We are, indeed, in all disputes with the colonies, 
 by the necessity of things, the judge. It is true, Sir. 
 But I confess that the character of judge in my own 
 cause is a thing that frightens me. Instead of filling me 
 with pride, I am exceedingly humbled by it. I cannot 
 
 io proceed with a stern, assured, judicial confidence, until 
 I find myself in something more like a judicial character. 
 I must have these hesitations as long as I am compelled 
 to recollect that, in my little reading upon such contests 
 as these, the sense of mankind has at least as often de- 
 
 iS cided against the superior as the subordinate power. 
 Sir, let me add, too, that the opinion of my having some 
 abstract right in my favor would not put me much at my 
 ease in passing sentence, unless I could be sure that there 
 were no rights which, in their exercise under certain cir- 
 
 20 cumstances, were not the most odious of all wrongs and 
 the most vexatious of all injustice. Sir, these considera- 
 tions have great weight with me, when I find things so 
 circumstanced, that I see the same party at once a civil 
 litigant against me in point of right and a culprit before 
 
 25 me, while I sit as a criminal judge on acts of his, whose 
 moral quality is to be decided upon the merits of that 
 very litigation. Men are every now and then put, by 
 the complexity of human affairs, into strange situations ; 
 but justice is the same, let the judge be in what situation 
 
 30 he will. 
 
 62. There is, Sir, also a circumstance which con- 
 vinces me that this mode of criminal proceeding is not 
 
38 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 (at least in the present stage of our contest) altogether 
 expedient, which is nothing less than the conduct of 
 those very persons who have seemed to adopt that mode, 
 by lately declaring a rebellion in Massachusetts Bay, as 
 they had formerly addressed to have traitors brought 5 
 hither, under an act of Henry the Eighth, for trial. For 
 though rebellion is declared, it is not proceeded against 
 as such ; nor have any steps been taken towards the ap- 
 prehension or conviction of any individual offender, 
 either on our late or our former address ; but modes of 10 
 public coercion have been adopted, and such as have 
 much more resemblance to a sort of qualified hostility 
 towards an independent power than the punishment of 
 rebellious subjects. All this seems rather inconsistent ; 
 but it shows how difficult it is to apply these juridical 15 
 ideas to our present case. 
 
 65. In this situation, let us seriously and coolly 
 ponder. What is it we have got by all our menaces, 
 which have been many and ferocious ? What advantage 
 have we derived from the penal laws we have passed, 20 
 and which, for the time, have been severe and numerous ? 
 What advances have we made towards our object, by 
 the sending of a force which, by land and sea, is no 
 contemptible strength? Has the disorder abated? 
 Nothing less. When I see things in this situation, after 25 
 such confident hopes, bold promises and active exertions, 
 I cannot for my life avoid a suspicion that the plan itself 
 is not correctly right. 
 
 64. If, then, the removal of the causes of this spirit 
 of American liberty be for the greater part, or rather 30 
 entirely, impracticable ; if the ideas of criminal process 
 be inapplicable, or if applicable, are in the highest de- 
 
ENGLAND'S RIGHT TO TAX. 39 
 
 gree inexpedient ; what way yet remains ? No way is 
 open but the third and last, — to comply with the Ameri- 
 can spirit as necessary ; or, if you please, to submit to it 
 as a necessary evil. 
 5 65. If we adopt this mode, if we mean to conciliate 
 and concede, let us see of what nature the concession 
 ought to be. To ascertain the nature of our concession, 
 we must look at their complaint. The colonies complain 
 that they have not the characteristic mark and seal of 
 
 10 British freedom. They complain that they are taxed in 
 a Parliament in which they are not represented. If you 
 mean to satisfy them at all, you must satisfy them with 
 regard to this complaint. If you mean to please any 
 people, you must give them the boon which they ask, — 
 
 15 not what you may think better for them, but of a kind 
 totally different. Such an act may be a wise regulation, 
 but it is no concession ; whereas our present theme is the 
 mode of giving satisfaction. 
 
 66. Sir, I think you must perceive that I am resolved 
 
 20 this day to have nothing at all to do with the question of 
 the right of taxation. Some gentlemen startle, — but it 
 is true ; I put it totally out of the question. It is less 
 than nothing in my consideration. I do not indeed won- 
 der, nor will you, Sir, that gentlemen of profound learn- 
 
 25 ing are fond of displaying it on this profound subject. 
 But my consideration is narrow, confined, and wholly 
 limited to the policy of the question. I do not examine 
 whether the giving away a man's money be a power ex- 
 cepted and reserved out of the general trust of govern- 
 
 30 ment ; and how far all mankind, in all forms of polity, 
 are entitled to an exercise of that right by the charter of 
 Nature ; or whether, on the contrary, a right of taxation 
 
4 o ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 is necessarily involved in the general principle of legisla- 
 tion and inseparable from the ordinary supreme power. 
 These are deep questions, where great names militate 
 against each other ; where reason is perplexed ; and an 
 appeal to authorities only thickens the confusion : for high 5 
 and reverend authorities lift up their heads on both sides ; 
 and there is no sure footing in the middle. This point 
 is the great 
 
 Serbonian bog, 
 Betwixt Damiata and Mount Casius old, IO 
 
 Where armies whole have sunk. 
 
 I do not intend to be overwhelmed in that bog, though 
 in such respectable company. The question with me is, 
 not whether you have a right to render your people mis- 
 erable, but whether it is not your interest to make them 15 
 happy. It is not what a lawyer tells me I may do, but 
 what humanity, reason and justice tell me I ought to do. 
 Is a politic act the worse for being a generous one ? Is 
 no concession proper but that which is made from your 
 want of right to keep what you grant ? Or does it lessen 20 
 the grace or dignity of relaxing in the exercise of an 
 odious claim, because you have your evidence-room full 
 of titles and your magazines stuffed with arms to enforce 
 them? What signify all those titles and all those arms? 
 Of what avail are they, when the reason of the thing 25 
 tells me that the assertion of my title is the loss of my 
 suit ; and that I could do nothing but wound myself by 
 the use of my own weapons ? 
 
 6j. Such is steadfastly my opinion of the absolute 
 necessity of keeping up the concord of this empire by a 30 
 unity of spirit, though in a diversity of operations, that 
 
EXTEND CONSTITUTIONAL PRIVILEGES. 41 
 
 if I were sure the colonists had at their leaving this 
 country sealed a regular compact of servitude, that they 
 had solemnly abjured all the rights of citizens, that they 
 had made a vow to renounce all ideas of liberty for 
 5 them and their posterity to all generations ; yet I should 
 hold myself obliged to conform to the temper I found 
 universally prevalent in my own day, and to govern two 
 million of men, impatient of servitude, on the principles 
 of freedom. I am not determining a point of law, I am 
 10 restoring tranquillity; and the general character and 
 situation of a people must determine what sort of govern- 
 ment is fitted for them. That point nothing else can or 
 ought to determine. 
 
 68. My idea, therefore, without considering whether 
 15 we yield as matter of right or grant as matter of favor, 
 
 is to admit the people of our colonies into an interest in the 
 Constitution ; and by recording that admission in the 
 journals of Parliament, to give them as strong an assur- 
 ance as the nature of the thing will admit, that we mean 
 20 forever to adhere to that solemn declaration of systematic 
 indulgence. 
 
 69. Some years ago, the repeal of a revenue act, 
 upon its understood principle, might have served to show 
 that we intended an unconditional abatement of the ex- 
 
 25 ercise of a taxing power. Such a measure was then 
 sufficient to remove all suspicion and to give perfect con- 
 tent. But unfortunate events since that time may make 
 something further necessary • and not more necessary for 
 the satisfaction of the colonies than for the dignity and 
 
 30 consistency of our own future proceedings. 
 
 jo. I have taken a very incorrect measure of the dis- 
 position of the House, if this proposal in itself would be 
 
42 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 received with dislike. I think, Sir, we have few Ameri- 
 can financiers. But our misfortune is, we are too acute ; 
 we are too exquisite in our conjectures of the future, 
 for men oppressed with such great and present evils. 
 The more moderate among the opposers of parliamen- 5 
 tary concession freely confess that they hope no good 
 from taxation ; but they apprehend the colonists have 
 further views, and if this point were conceded, they 
 would instantly attack the trade laws. These gentlemen 
 are convinced that this was the intention from the be- 10 
 ginning, and the quarrel of the Americans with taxation 
 was no more than a cloak and cover to this design. 
 Such has been the language, even of a gentleman of real 
 moderation and of a natural temper well adjusted to fair 
 and equal government. I am, however, Sir, not a little 15 
 surprised at this kind of discourse whenever I hear it ; 
 and I am the more surprised on account of the argu- 
 ments which I constantly find in company with it, and 
 which are often urged from the same mouths and on the 
 same day. 20 
 
 yi . For instance, when we allege that it is against rea- 
 son to tax a people under so many restraints in trade as 
 the Americans, the noble lord in the blue ribbon shall tell 
 you that the restraints on trade are futile and useless, of 
 no advantage to us, and of no burden to those on whom 25 
 they are imposed ; that the trade to America is not se- 
 cured by the Acts of Navigation, but by the natural and 
 irresistible advantage of a commercial preference. 
 
 72. Such is the merit of the trade laws in this posture 
 of the debate. But when strong internal circumstances 30 
 are urged against the taxes ; when the scheme is dissected ; 
 when experience and the nature of things are brought to 
 
TRADE-LA WS ENDANGERED. 43 
 
 prove, and do prove, the utter impossibility of obtaining 
 an effective revenue from the colonies ; — when these 
 things are pressed, or rather press themselves, so as to 
 drive the advocates of colony taxes to a clear admission 
 5 of the futility of the scheme; then, Sir, the sleeping 
 trade laws revive from their trance, and this useless taxa- 
 tion is to be kept sacred, not for its own sake, but as a 
 counterguard and security of the laws of trade. 
 
 jj. Then, Sir, you keep up revenue laws which are 
 
 10 mischievous in order to preserve trade laws that are use- 
 less. Such is the wisdom of our plan in both its mem- 
 bers. They are separately given up as of no value ; 
 and yet one is always to be defended for the sake of the 
 other. But I cannot agree with the noble lord nor with 
 
 15 the pamphlet from whence he seems to have borrowed 
 these ideas concerning the inutility of the trade laws; 
 for without idolizing them, I am sure they are still in 
 many ways of great use to us, and in former times they 
 have been of the greatest. They do confine, and they 
 
 20 do greatly narrow, the market for the Americans. But 
 my perfect conviction of this does not help me in the 
 least to discern how the revenue laws form any security 
 whatsoever to the commercial regulations ; or that these 
 commercial regulations are the true ground of the 
 
 25 quarrel ; or that the giving way in any one instance of 
 authority is to lose all that may remain unconceded. 
 
 74. One fact is clear and indisputable : the public 
 and avowed origin of this quarrel was on taxation. This 
 quarrel has indeed brought on new disputes on new 
 
 30 questions ; but certainly the least bitter and the fewest 
 of all on the trade laws. To judge which of the two be 
 the real, radical cause of quarrel, we have to see whether 
 
44 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 the commercial dispute did, in order of time, precede 
 the dispute on taxation ? There is not a shadow of 
 evidence for it. Next, to enable us to judge whether at 
 this moment a dislike to the trade laws be the real cause 
 of quarrel, it is absolutely necessary to put the taxes out 5 
 of the question by a repeal. See how the Americans act 
 in this position, and then you will be able to discern 
 correctly what is the true object of the controversy, or 
 whether any controversy at all will remain. Unless you 
 consent to remove this cause of difference, it is impos- io 
 sible with decency to assert that the dispute is not upon 
 what it is avowed to be. And I would, Sir, recommend 
 to your serious consideration, whether it be prudent to 
 form a rule for punishing people, not on their own acts, 
 but on your conjectures. Surely it is preposterous at the 15 
 very best. It is not justifying your anger by their mis- 
 conduct, but it is converting your ill-will into their 
 delinquency. 
 
 75. But the colonies will go further. Alas ! alas ! 
 when will this speculating against fact and reason end ? 20 
 What will quiet these panic fears which we entertain of 
 the hostile effect of a conciliatory conduct ? Is it true 
 that no case can exist in which it is proper for the sover- 
 eign to accede to the desires of his discontented subjects? 
 Is there anything peculiar in this case to make a rule for 25 
 itself? Is all authority of course lost, when it is not 
 pushed to the extreme ? Is it a certain maxim that the 
 fewer causes of dissatisfaction are left by government, the 
 more the subject will be inclined to resist and rebel ? 
 
 j6. All these objections being in fact no more than 30 
 suspicions, conjectures, divinations, formed in defiance 
 of fact and experience, they did not, Sir, discourage me 
 
ENGLISH HISTORY THE GUIDE. 45 
 
 from entertaining the idea of a conciliatory concession, 
 founded on the principles which I have just stated. 
 
 yy. In forming a plan for this purpose, I endeavored 
 to put myself in that frame of mind which was the most 
 5 natural and the most reasonable, and which was certainly 
 the most probable means of securing me from all error. 
 I set out with a perfect distrust of my own abilities, a 
 total renunciation of every speculation of my own ; and 
 with a profound reverence for the wisdom of our an- 
 10 cestors, who have left us the inheritance of so happy a 
 constitution and so flourishing an empire, and, what is a 
 thousand times more valuable, the treasury of the max- 
 ims and principles which formed the one and obtained 
 the other. 
 15 78. During the reigns of the kings of Spain of the 
 Austrian family, whenever they were at a loss in the 
 Spanish councils, it was common for their statesmen to 
 say that they ought to consult the genius of Philip the 
 Second. The genius of Philip the Second might mislead 
 20 them ; and the issue of their affairs showed that they had 
 not chosen the most perfect standard. But, Sir, I am 
 sure that I shall not be misled, when in a case of consti- 
 tutional difficulty I consult the genius of the English 
 Constitution. Consulting at that oracle (it was with all 
 25 due humility and piety), I found four capital examples 
 in a similar Case before me : those of Ireland, Wales, 
 Chester and Durham. 
 
 79. Ireland before the English conquest, though 
 
 never governed by a despotic power, had no Par- 
 
 30 liament. How far the English Parliament itself was 
 
 at that time modelled according to the present form 
 
 is disputed among antiquarians. But we have all the 
 
46 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 reason in the world to be assured that a form of Parlia- 
 ment such as England then enjoyed she instantly com- 
 municated to Ireland ; and we are equally sure that almost 
 every successive improvement in constitutional liberty, as 
 fast as it was made here, was transmitted thither. The 5 
 feudal baronage and the feudal knighthood, the roots of 
 our primitive constitution, were early transplanted into 
 that soil, and grew and flourished there. Magna Charta, 
 if it did not give us originally the House of Commons, 
 gave us at least a House of Commons of weight and 10 
 consequence. But your ancestors did not churlishly sit 
 down alone to the feast of Magna Charta. Ireland was 
 made immediately a partaker. This benefit of English 
 laws and liberties, I confess, was not at first extended to 
 all Ireland. Mark the consequence. English authority 15 
 and English liberties had exactly the same boundaries. 
 Your standard could never be advanced an inch before 
 your privileges. Sir John Davies shows beyond a doubt 
 that the refusal of a general communication of these 
 rights was the true cause why Ireland was five hundred 20 
 years in subduing ; and after the vain projects of a mili- 
 tary government, attempted in the reign of Queen Eliza- 
 beth, it was soon discovered that nothing could make that 
 country English in civility and allegiance, but your laws 
 and your forms of legislature. It was not English arms, 25 
 but the English Constitution, that conquered Ireland. 
 From that time Ireland has ever had a general Parlia- 
 ment, as she had before a partial Parliament. You 
 changed the people, you altered the religion, but you 
 never touched the form or the vital substance of free gov- 30 
 eminent in that kingdom. You deposed kings; you 
 restored them ; you altered the succession to theirs as 
 
IRELAND AND WALES. 47 
 
 well as to your own crown ; but you never altered their 
 constitution, the principle of which was respected by 
 usurpation, restored with the restoration of monarchy, 
 and established, I trust, forever by the glorious Revolu- 
 5 tion. This has made Ireland the great and flourishing 
 kingdom that it is ; and from a disgrace and a burden 
 intolerable to this nation, has rendered her a principal 
 part of her strength and ornament. This country cannot 
 be said to have ever formally taxed her. The irregular 
 
 10 things done in the confusion of mighty troubles and on 
 the hinge of great revolutions, even if all were done that 
 is said to have been done, form no example. If they 
 have any effect in argument, they make an exception to 
 prove the rule. None of your own liberties could stand 
 
 15 a moment, if the casual deviations from them at such 
 times were suffered to be used as proofs of their nullity. 
 By the lucrative amount of such casual breaches in the 
 Constitution, judge what the stated and fixed rule of sup- 
 ply has been in that kingdom. Your Irish pensioners 
 
 20 would starve, if they had no other fund to live on than 
 taxes granted by English authority. Turn your eyes to 
 those popular grants from whence all your great supplies 
 are come, and learn to respect that only source of public 
 wealth in the British Empire. 
 
 25 80. My next example is Wales. This country was 
 said to be reduced by Henry the Third. It was said more 
 truly to be so by Edward the First. But though then 
 conquered, it was not looked upon as any part of the 
 realm of England. Its old constitution, whatever that 
 
 30 might have been, was destroyed, and no good one was 
 substituted in its place. The care of that tract was put 
 into the hands of Lords Marchers, — a form of govern- 
 
48 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 ment of a very singular kind, a strange, heterogeneous 
 monster, something between hostility and government ; 
 perhaps it has a sort of resemblance, according to the 
 modes of those times, to that of commander-in-chief at 
 present, to whom all civil power is granted as secondary. 5 
 The manners of the Welsh nation followed the genius of 
 the government : the people were ferocious, restive, 
 savage, and uncultivated, sometimes composed, never 
 pacified. Wales, within itself, was in perpetual disorder ; 
 and it kept the frontier of England in perpetual alarm. 10 
 Benefits from it to the state there were none. Wales was 
 only known to England by incursion and invasion. 
 
 81. Sir, during that state of things Parliament was 
 not idle. They attempted to subdue the fierce spirit of 
 the Welsh by all sorts of rigorous laws. They pro- 15 
 hibited by statute the sending all sorts of arms into 
 Wales, as you prohibit by proclamation (with something 
 more of doubt on the legality) the sending arms to 
 America. They disarmed the Welsh by statute, as you 
 attempted (but still with more question on the legality) 20 
 to disarm New England by an instruction. They made 
 an act to drag offenders from Wales into England for 
 trial, as you have done (but with more hardship) with 
 regard to America. By another act, where one of the 
 parties was an Englishman, they ordained that his trial 25 
 should be always by English. They made acts to restrain 
 trade, as you do ; and they prevented the Welsh from the 
 use of fairs and markets, as you do the Americans from 
 fisheries and foreign ports. In short, when the statute- 
 book was not quite so much swelled as it is now, you find 30 
 no less than fifteen acts of penal regulation on the sub- 
 ject of Wales. 
 
LIBERTY BEGETS OBEDIENCE. 49 
 
 82. Here we rub our hands — A fine body of prece- 
 dents for the authority of Parliament and the use of it ! 
 — I admit it fully ; and pray add likewise to these prece- 
 dents, that all the while Wales rid this kingdom like an 
 5 incubus ; that it was an unprofitable and oppressive bur- 
 den ; and that an Englishman travelling in that country 
 could not go six yards from the high-road without being 
 murdered. 
 
 #3. The march of the human mind is slow. Sir, it 
 
 10 was not until after two hundred years discovered that by 
 an eternal law Providence had decreed vexation to vio- 
 lence, and poverty to rapine. Your ancestors did, how- 
 ever, at length open their eyes to the ill-husbandry of 
 injustice. They found that the tyranny of a free people 
 
 15 could of all tyrannies the least be endured; and that 
 laws made against an whole nation were not the most 
 effectual methods for securing its obedience. Accord- 
 ingly, in the twenty-seventh year of Henry the Eighth, 
 the course was entirely altered. With a preamble stat- 
 
 20 ing the entire and perfect rights of the crown of Eng- 
 land, it gave to the Welsh all the rights and privileges of 
 English subjects. A political order was established ; the 
 military power gave way to the civil ; the marches were 
 turned into counties. But that a nation should have a 
 
 25 right to English liberties, and yet no share at all in the 
 fundamental security of these liberties, — the grant of 
 their own property, — seemed a thing so incongruous that 
 eight years after, — that is, in the thirty-fifth of that 
 reign, — a complete and not ill-proportioned representa- 
 
 30 tion by counties and boroughs was bestowed upon Wales 
 by act of Parliament. From that moment, as by a 
 charm, the tumults subsided ; obedience was restored ; ■ 
 
5° 
 
 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 peace, order and civilization followed in the train of 
 liberty. When the day-star of the English Constitution 
 had arisen in their hearts, all was harmony within and 
 without: — 
 
 — Simul alba nautis 5 
 
 Stella refulsit, 
 Defluit saxis agitatus humor ; 
 Concidunt venti, fugiuntque nubes, 
 Et minax (quod sic voluere) ponto 
 
 Unda recumbit. 10 
 
 84. The very same year the County Palatine of 
 Chester received the same relief from its oppressions and 
 the same remedy to its disorders. Before this time 
 Chester was little less distempered than Wales. The in- 
 habitants, without rights themselves, were the fittest to 15 
 destroy the rights of others ; and from thence Richard 
 the Second drew the standing army of archers with 
 which for a time he oppressed England. The people of 
 Chester applied to Parliament in a petition penned as I 
 shall read to you :— 2 ° 
 
 To the King our Sovereign Lord, in most humble wise shewn 
 unto your most excellent Majesty the inhabitants of your Grace's 
 County Palatine of Chester: (1) That where the said County 
 Palatine of Chester is and hath been always hitherto exempt, ex- 
 cluded and separated out and from your high court of Parliament, 25 
 to have any knights and burgesses within the said court ; by reason 
 whereof the said inhabitants have hitherto sustained manifold dis- 
 herisons, losses and damages, as well in their lands, goods and 
 bodies, as in the good, civil and politic governance and maintenance 
 of the commonwealth of their said country. (2) And forasmuch 30 
 as the said inhabitants have always hitherto been bound by the 
 acts and statutes made and ordained by your said Highness and 
 
CHESTER AND DURHAM. 51 
 
 your most noble progenitors, by authority of the said court, as far 
 forth as other counties, cities and boroughs have been, that have 
 had their knights and burgesses within your said court of Parlia- 
 ment, and yet have had neither knight ne burgess there for the said 
 
 c County Palatine ; the said inhabitants, for lack thereof, have been 
 oftentimes touched and grieved with acts and statutes made within 
 the said court, as well derogatory unto the most ancient jurisdic- 
 tions, liberties and privileges of your said County Palatine, as preju- 
 dicial unto the commonwealth, quietness, rest and peace of your 
 
 10 Grace's most bounden subjects inhabiting within the same. 
 
 #5. What did Parliament with this audacious ad- 
 dress ? Reject it as a libel ? Treat it as an affront to 
 government ? Spurn it as a derogation from the rights 
 of legislature? Did they toss it over the table? Did 
 
 15 they burn it by the hands of the common hangman ? 
 They took the petition of grievance, all rugged as it was, 
 without softening or temperament, unpurged of the origi- 
 nal bitterness and indignation of complaint ; they made 
 it the very preamble to their act of redress, and conse- 
 
 20 crated its principle to all ages in the sanctuary of legis- 
 lation. 
 
 86. Here is my third example. It was attended with 
 the success of the two former. Chester, civilized as well 
 as Wales, has demonstrated that freedom, and not servi- 
 
 25 tude, is the cure for anarchy; as religion, and not athe- 
 ism, is the true remedy for superstition. Sir, this pattern 
 of Chester was followed in the reign of Charles the Sec- 
 ond with regard to the County Palatine of Durham, 
 which is my fourth example. This county had long lain 
 
 30 out of the pale of free legislation. So scrupulously was 
 the example of Chester followed, that the style of the 
 preamble is nearly the same with that of the Chester act; 
 
52 
 
 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 and without affecting the abstract extent of the authority 
 of Parliament, it recognizes the equity of not suffering 
 any considerable district in which the British subjects 
 may act as a body, to be taxed without their own voice 
 in the grant. 5 
 
 87. Now if the doctrines of policy contained in these 
 preambles and the force of these examples in the acts of 
 Parliaments avail anything, what can be said against 
 applying them with regard to America? Are not the 
 people of America as much Englishmen as the Welsh ? 10 
 The preamble of the act of Henry the Eighth says the 
 Welsh speak a language no way resembling that of his 
 Majesty's English subjects. Are the Americans not as 
 numerous? If we may trust the learned and accurate 
 Judge Barrington's account of North Wales, and take 15 
 that as a standard to measure the rest, there is no com- 
 parison. The people cannot amount to above 200,000, 
 — not a tenth part of the number in the colonies. Is 
 America in rebellion ? Wales was hardly ever free from it. 
 Have you attempted to govern America by penal statutes ? 20 
 You made fifteen for Wales. But your legislative au- 
 thority is perfect with regard to America. Was it less 
 perfect in Wales, Chester, and Durham ? But America 
 is virtually represented. What ! does the electric force 
 of virtual representation more easily pass over the Atlantic 25 
 than pervade Wales, which lies in your neighborhood? 
 or than Chester and Durham, surrounded by abundance 
 of representation that is actual and palpable ? But, Sir, 
 your ancestors thought this sort of virtual representation, 
 however ample, to be totally insufficient for the freedom 30 
 of the inhabitants of territories that are so near and com- 
 paratively so inconsiderable. How then can I think it 
 
REPRESENTA TION 1MPRA CTICABLE. 5 3 
 
 sufficient for those which are infinitely greater and in- 
 finitely more remote ? 
 
 88. You will now, Sir, perhaps imagine that I am on 
 the point of proposing to you a scheme for a representa- 
 5 tion of the colonies in Parliament. Perhaps I might be 
 inclined to entertain some such thought ; but a great 
 flood stops me in my course. Opposuit natura — I can- 
 not remove the eternal barriers of the creation. The 
 thing, in that mode, I do not know to be possible. As 
 
 10 I meddle with no theory, I do not absolutely assert the 
 impracticability of such a representation : but I do not 
 see my way to it ; and those who have been more confi- 
 dent have not been more successful. However, the arm 
 of public benevolence is not shortened, and there are 
 
 15 often several means to the same end. What Nature has 
 disjoined in one way Wisdom may unite in another. 
 AVhen we cannot give the benefit as we would wish, let 
 us not refuse it altogether. If we cannot give the prin- 
 cipal, let us find a substitute. But how ? Where ? What 
 
 20 substitute? 
 
 8g. Fortunately I am not obliged for the ways and 
 means of this substitute to tax my own unproductive in- 
 vention. I am not even obliged to go to the rich treas- 
 ury of the fertile framers of imaginary commonwealths, 
 
 25 not to the Republic of Plato, not to the Utopia of More, 
 not to the Oceana of Harrington. It is before me; it 
 is at my feet, — 
 
 And the rude swain 
 Treads daily on it with his clouted shoon. 
 
 3° I only wish you to recognize, for the theory, the an- 
 cient constitutional policy of this kingdom with regard 
 
t 
 
 54 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 to representation, as that policy has been declared in acts ^ 
 of Parliament ; and as to the practice, to return to that 
 mode which a uniform experience has marked out to you 
 as best, and in which you walked with security, advan- 
 tage and honor, until the year 1763. 5' 
 
 go. My resolutions therefore mean to establish the 
 equity and justice of a taxation of America by grant, 
 and not by imposition ; to mark the legal competency of 
 the colony assemblies for the support of their government 
 in peace and for public aids in time of war ; to acknowl- 10 
 edge that this legal competency has had a dutiful and 
 beneficial exercise ; and that experience has shown the 
 benefit of their grants and the futility of parliamentary r 
 taxation as a method of supply. 
 
 pi. These solid truths compose six fundamental 15 
 propositions. There are three more resolutions corollary 
 to these. If you admit the first set, you can hardly re- 
 ject the others. But if you admit the first, I shall be 
 far from solicitous whether you accept or refuse the last. 
 I think these six massive pillars will be of strength suffi- 20 
 cient to support the temple of British concord. I have 
 no more doubt than I entertain of my existence that, if 
 you admitted these, you would command an immediate 
 peace and, with but tolerable future management, a last- 
 ing obedience in America. I am not arrogant in 25 
 this confident assurance. The propositions are all 
 mere matters of fact ; and if they are such facts as 
 draw irresistible conclusions even in the stating, this 
 is the power of truth, and not any management of 
 mine. 30 
 
 Q2. Sir, I shall open the whole plan to you, together 
 with such observations on the motions as may tend to 
 
FIRST TWO RESOLUTIONS. 55 
 
 illustrate them where they may want explanation. The 
 first is a resolution, — 
 
 That the colonies and plantations of Great Britain in North 
 America, consisting of fourteen separate governments, and con- 
 c taining two millions and upwards of free inhabitants, have not 
 had the liberty and privilege of electing and sending any knights 
 and burgesses, or others, to represent them in the high court of 
 Parliament. 
 
 This is a plain matter of fact, necessary to be laid down, 
 10 and (excepting the description) it is laid down in the 
 language of the constitution ; it is taken nearly verbatim 
 from acts of Parliament. 
 
 93. The second is like unto the first, — 
 
 That the said colonies and plantations have been liable to, and 
 Ic bounden by, several subsidies, payments, rates and taxes, given 
 and granted by Parliament, though the said colonies and planta- 
 tions have not their knights and burgesses in the said high court 
 of Parliament, of their own election, to represent the condition of 
 their country ; by lack whereof they have been oftentimes touched 
 20 and grieved by subsidies given, granted and assented to, in the 
 said court, in a manner prejudicial to the commonwealth, quiet- 
 ness, rest and peace of the subjects inhabiting within the same. 
 
 94. Is this description too hot or too cold, too strong 
 or too weak ? Does it arrogate too much to the supreme 
 
 25 legislature ? Does it lean too much to the claims of the 
 people ? If it runs into any of these errors, the fault is 
 not mine. It is the language of your own ancient acts 
 of Parliament : — 
 
 Non meus hie sermo, sed quae praecepit Ofellus, 
 30 Rusticus, abnormis sapiens. 
 
 It is the genuine produce of the ancient, rustic, manly, 
 
56 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 home-bred sense of this country, — I did not dare to rub 
 off a particle of the venerable rust that rather adorns 
 and preserves, than destroys, the metal. It would be a 
 profanation to touch with a tool the stones which con- 
 struct the sacred altar of peace. I would not violate 5 
 with modern polish the ingenuous and noble roughness 
 of these truly constitutional materials. Above all things, 
 I was resolved not to be guilty of tampering, — the odious 
 vice of restless and unstable minds. I put my foot in 
 the tracks of our forefathers, where I can neither wander 10 
 nor stumble. Determining to fix articles of peace, I was 
 resolved not to be wise beyond what was written ; I was 
 resolved to use nothing else than the form of sound 
 words, to let others abound in their own sense, and care- 
 fully to abstain from all expressions of my own. What 15 
 the law has said, I say. In all things else I am silent. 
 I have no organ but for her words. This, if it be not 
 ingenious, I am sure is safe. 
 
 p$. There are indeed words expressive of grievance 
 in this second resolution, which those who are resolved 20 
 always to be in the right will deny to contain matter of 
 fact, as applied to the present case, although Parliament 
 thought them true with regard to the counties of Ches- 
 ter and Durham. They will deny that the Americans 
 were ever "touched and grieved" with the taxes. If 25 
 they consider nothing in taxes but their weight as pecun- 
 iary impositions, there might be some pretence for this 
 denial. But men may be sorely touched and deeply 
 grieved in their privileges as well as in their purses. 
 Men may lose little in property by the act which takes 30 
 away all their freedom. When a man is robbed of a trifle 
 on the highway, it is not the twopence lost that consti- 
 
EVIDENCE OF GRIEVANCES. 57 
 
 tutes the capital outrage. This is not confined to privi- 
 leges. Even ancient indulgences withdrawn, without 
 offence on the part of those who enjoyed such favors, 
 operate as grievances. But were the Americans then not 
 
 5 touched and grieved by the taxes, in some measure, 
 merely as taxes ? If so, why were they almost all either 
 wholly repealed or exceedingly reduced? Were they 
 not touched and grieved even by the regulating duties of 
 the sixth of George the Second? Else why were the 
 
 10 duties first reduced to one-third in 1764, and afterwards 
 to a third of that third in the year 1766? Were they not 
 touched and grieved by the Stamp Act? I shall say 
 they were, until that tax is revived. Were they not 
 touched and grieved by the duties of 1767, which were 
 
 15 likewise repealed, and which Lord Hillsborough tells you 
 (for the ministry) were laid contrary to the true principle 
 of commerce ? Is not the assurance given by that noble 
 person to the colonies of a resolution to lay no more 
 taxes on them, an admission that taxes would touch and 
 
 20 grieve them ? Is not the resolution of the noble lord in 
 the blue ribbon, now standing on your journals, the 
 strongest of all proofs that parliamentary subsidies really 
 touched and grieved them ? Else why all these changes, 
 modifications, repeals, assurances and resolutions ? 
 
 25 96. The next proposition is, — 
 
 That, from the distance of the said colonies and from other cir- 
 cumstances, no method hath hitherto been devised for procuring a 
 representation in Parliament for the said colonies. 
 
 This is an assertion of a fact. I go no further on the 
 30 paper; though in my private judgment a useful repre- 
 sentation is impossible. I am sure it is not desired by 
 
58 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 them ; nor ought it, perhaps, by us : but I abstain from 
 opinions. 
 
 97. The fourth resolution is, — 
 
 That each of the said colonies hath within itself a body, chosen 
 in part or in the whole by the freemen, freeholders or other free 5 
 inhabitants thereof, commonly called the general assembly, or 
 general court ; with powers legally to raise, levy and assess, ac- 
 cording to the several usages of such colonies, duties and taxes 
 towards defraying all sorts of public services. 
 
 pS. This competence in the colony assemblies is cer- 10 
 tain. It is proved by the whole tenor of their acts of 
 supply in all the assemblies, in which the constant style 
 of granting is, " An aid to his Majesty"; and acts 
 granting to the crown have regularly for near a century 
 passed the public offices without dispute. Those who 15 
 have been pleased paradoxically to deny this right, hold- 
 ing that none but the British Parliament can grant to the 
 crown, are wished to look to what is done, not only in 
 the colonies, but in Ireland, in one uniform, unbroken 
 tenor every session. Sir, I am surprised that this doc- 20 
 trine should come from some of the law servants of the 
 crown. I say that if the crown could be responsible, his 
 Majesty — but certainly the ministers, and even these law 
 officers themselves through whose hands the acts pass, 
 biennially in Ireland or annually in the colonies, are in 25 
 an habitual course of committing impeachable offences. 
 What habitual offenders have been all presidents of the 
 council, all secretaries of state, all first lords of trade, all 
 attorneys and all solicitors-general ! However, they are 
 safe, as no one impeaches them ; and there is no ground 30 
 of charge against them, except in their. own unfounded 
 theories. 
 
FIFTH RESOLUTION. 59 
 
 gg. The fifth resolution is also a resolution of fact,— 
 
 That the said general assemblies, general courts, or other bodies 
 legally qualified as aforesaid, have at sundry times freely granted 
 several large subsidies and public aids for his Majesty's service, ac- 
 c cording to their abilities, when required thereto by letter from one 
 of his Majesty's principal secretaries of state ; and that their right 
 to grant the same and their cheerfulness and sufficiency in the said 
 grants have been at sundry times acknowledged by Parliament. 
 
 To say nothing of their great expenses in the Indian 
 
 10 wars, and not to take their exertion in foreign ones so 
 
 high as the supplies in the year 1695, not to go back to 
 
 their public contributions in the year 17 10, I shall begin 
 
 to travel only where the journals give me light, — resolving 
 
 to deal in nothing but fact authenticated by parliamentary 
 
 15 record, and to build myself wholly on that solid basis. 
 
 /OO. On the 4th of April, 1748, a committee of this 
 
 House came to the following resolution : — 
 
 Resolved, That it is the opinion of this committee that it is just 
 and reasonable that the several provinces and colonies of Massa- 
 20 chusetts Bay, New Hampshire, Connecticut and Rhode Island, be 
 reimbursed the expenses they have been at in taking and securing 
 to the crown of Great Britain the island of Cape Breton and its 
 dependencies. 
 
 10 1. These expenses were immense for such colonies. 
 25 They were above ^£200,000 sterling : money first raised 
 
 and advanced on their public credit. 
 
 102. On the 28th of January, 1756, a message from 
 the king came to us to this effect : — 
 
 His Majesty, being sensible of the zeal and vigor with which 
 -20 bis faithful subjects of certain colonies in North America have ex- 
 erted themselves in defence of his Majesty's just rights and posses- 
 
60 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 sions, recommends it to this House to take the same into their con- 
 sideration, and to enable his Majesty to give them such assistance 
 as may be a proper reward and encouragement. 
 
 IOJ. On the 3d of February, 1756, the House came 
 to a suitable resolution, expressed in words nearly the 5 
 same as those of the message ; but with the further addi- 
 tion that the money then voted was as an encouragement 
 to the colonies to exert themselves with vigor. It will 
 not be necessary to go through all the testimonies which 
 your own records have given to the truth of my resolu- 10 
 tions. I will only refer you to the places in the journals : — 
 
 Vol. XXVII.— 16th and 19th May, 1757. 
 
 Vol. XXVIII.— June 1st, 1758; April 26th and 30th, 1759; 
 March 26th and 31st, and April 28th, 1760 ; Jan. 9th and 20th, 1761. 
 
 Vol. XXIX. — Jan. 22d and 26th, 1762; March 14th and 17th, 15 
 1763- 
 
 104. Sir, here is the repeated acknowledgment of Par- 
 liament that the colonies not only gave, but gave to 
 satiety. This nation has formally acknowledged two 
 things : first, that the colonies had gone beyond their 20 
 abilities, Parliament having thought it necessary to reim- 
 burse them ; secondly, that they had acted legally and 
 laudably in their grants of money and their maintenance 
 of troops, since the compensation is expressly given as 
 reward and encouragement. Reward is not bestowed for 25 
 acts that are unlawful ; and encouragement is not held 
 out to things that deserve reprehension. My resolution 
 therefore does nothing more than collect into one propo- 
 sition what is scattered through your journals. I give 
 you nothing but your own ; and you cannot refuse in the 30 
 gross what you have so often acknowledged in detail. 
 
GRANT OR IMPOSITION? 6 1 
 
 The admission of this, which will be so honorable to 
 them and to you, will indeed be mortal to all the mis- 
 erable stories by which the passions of the misguided peo- 
 ple have been engaged in an unhappy system. The peo- 
 
 5 pie heard, indeed, from the beginning of these disputes, 
 one thing continually dinned in their ears, — that reason 
 and justice demanded that the Americans, who paid no 
 taxes, should be compelled to contribute. How did that 
 fact of their paying nothing stand when the taxing sys- 
 
 10 tern began ? When Mr. Grenville began to form his sys- 
 tem of American revenue, he stated in this House that 
 the colonies were then in debt two millions six hundred 
 thousand pounds sterling money, and was of opinion they 
 would discharge that debt in four years. On this state, 
 
 15 those untaxed people were actually subject to the pay- 
 ment of taxes to the amount of six hundred and fifty 
 thousand a year. In fact, however, Mr. Grenville was 
 mistaken. The funds given for sinking the debt did not 
 prove quite so ample as both the colonies and he ex- 
 
 20 pected. The calculation was too sanguine ; the reduc- 
 tion was not completed till some years after, and at differ- 
 ent times in different colonies. However, the taxes after 
 the war continued too great to bear any addition with 
 prudence or propriety ; and when the burdens imposed 
 
 25 in consequence of former requisitions were discharged, 
 . our tone became too high to resort again to requisition. 
 No colony since that time ever has had any requisition 
 whatsoever made to it. 
 
 105. We see the sense of the crown and the sense 
 
 30 of Parliament on the productive nature of a revenue by 
 grant. Now search the same journals for the produce 
 of the revenue by imposition. Where is it ? Let us know 
 
6l ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 the volume and the page. What is the gross, what is the 
 net produce ? To what service is it applied ? How have 
 you appropriated its surplus? What, can none of the 
 many skilful index-makers that we are now employing 
 find any trace of it ? Well, let them and that rest to- 5 
 gether. But are the journals, which say nothing of the 
 revenue, as silent on the discontent ? Oh, no ! a child 
 may find it. It is the melancholy burden and blot of 
 every page. 
 
 1 06. I think, then, I am, from those journals, justified 10 
 in the sixth and last resolution, which is, — 
 
 That it hath been found by experience that the manner of grant- 
 ing the said supplies and aids by the said general assemblies hath 
 been more agreeable to the said colonies, and more beneficial and 
 conducive to the public service, than the mode of giving and 15 
 granting aids in Parliament, to be raised and paid in the said 
 colonies. 
 
 ioy. This makes the whole of the fundamental part 
 of the plan. The conclusion is irresistible. You cannot 
 say that you were driven by any necessity to an exercise 20 
 of the utmost rights of legislature. You cannot assert 
 that you took on yourselves the task of imposing colony 
 taxes, from the want of another legal body that is com- 
 petent to the purpose of supplying the exigencies of the 
 state without wounding the prejudices of the people. 25 
 Neither is it true that the body so qualified and having 
 that competence had neglected the duty. 
 
 108. The question now, on all this accumulated mat- 
 ter, is, — whether you will choose to abide by a profitable 
 experience or a mischievous theory ; whether you choose 30 
 to build on imagination or fact ; whether you prefer en- 
 
FIRST COR OLLAR Y RE SOL UTION. 63 
 
 joyment or hope ; satisfaction in your subjects or discon- 
 tent ? 
 
 log. If these propositions are accepted, everything 
 which has been made to enforce a contrary system must, 
 5 I take it for granted, fall along with it. On that ground 
 I have drawn the following resolution, which, when it 
 comes to be moved, will naturally be divided in a proper 
 manner: — 
 
 That it may be proper to repeal an act made in the seventh year 
 
 10 of the reign of his present Majesty, entitled, " An act for grant- 
 ing certain duties in the British colonies and plantations in 
 America; for allowing a drawback of the duties of customs upon 
 the exportation from this kingdom, of coffee and cocoanuts of the 
 produce of the said colonies or plantations ; for discontinuing the 
 
 15 drawbacks payable on China earthenware exported to America; 
 and for more effectually preventing the clandestine running of 
 goods in the said colonies and plantations." — And that it may be 
 proper to repeal an act made in the fourteenth year of the reign 
 of his present Majesty, entitled, " An act to discontinue, in such 
 
 20 manner and for such time as are therein mentioned, the landing 
 and discharging, lading or shipping, of goods, wares and merchan- 
 dise, at the town and within the harbor of Boston, in the province 
 of Massachusetts Bay, in North America." — And that it may be 
 proper to repeal an act made in the fourteenth year of the reign 
 
 25 of his present Majesty, entitled, " An act for the impartial admin- 
 istration of justice in the cases of persons questioned for any acts 
 done by them in the execution of the law, or for the suppression 
 ofj riots and tumults, in the province of Massachusetts Bay, in New 
 E/ngland." — And that it may be proper to repeal an act made in 
 
 2o the fourteenth year of the reign of his present Majesty, entitled, 
 " An act for the better regulating the government of the province 
 of the Massachusetts Bay, in New England." — And also, that it 
 may be proper to explain and amend an act made in the thirty-fifth 
 year of the reign of King Henry the Eighth, entitled, " An act for 
 
 •?c t"|he trial of treasons committed out of the king's dominions." 
 
64 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 no. I wish, Sir, to repeal the Boston Port Bill, be- 
 cause (independently of the dangerous precedent of sus- 
 pending the rights of the subject during the king's 
 pleasure) it was passed, as I apprehend, with less 
 regularity and on more partial principles than it ought. 5 
 The corporation of Boston was not heard before it was 
 condemned. Other towns, full as guilty as she was, have 
 not had their ports blocked up. Even the Restrain- 
 ing Bill of the present session does not go to the 
 length of the Boston Port Act. The same ideas of 10 
 prudence which induced you not to extend equal punish- 
 ment to equal guilt, even when you were punishing, 
 induced me, who mean not to chastise but to reconcile, 
 to be satisfied with the punishment already partially 
 inflicted. 15 
 
 ///. Ideas of prudence and accommodation to cir- 
 cumstances prevent you from taking away the charters 
 of Connecticut and Rhode Island, as you have taken 
 away that of Massachusetts Colony, though the crown 
 has far less power in the two former provinces than it 20 
 enjoyed in the latter, and though the abuses have been 
 full as great and as flagrant in the exempted as in the 
 punished. The same reasons of prudence and accommo- 
 dation have weight with me in restoring the charter of 
 Massachusetts Bay. Besides, Sir, the act which changes 25 
 the charter of Massachusetts is in many particulars so 
 exceptionable that, if I did not wish absolutely to repeal 1 , 1 
 would by all means desire to alter it, as several of its 
 provisions tend to the subversion of all public and private 
 justice. Such, among others, is the power in the go ; v- 30 
 ernor to change the sheriff at his pleasure, and to mafxe 
 a new returning officer for every special cause. It is 
 
SECOND COROLLARY RESOLUTION. 65 
 
 shameful to behold such a regulation standing among 
 English laws. 
 
 112. The act for bringing persons accused of com- 
 mitting murder under the orders of government to 
 5 England for trial is but temporary. That act has 
 calculated the probable duration of our quarrel with the 
 colonies, and is accommodated to that supposed duration. 
 I would hasten the happy moment of reconciliation ; and 
 therefore must, on my principle, get rid of that most 
 
 10 justly obnoxious act. 
 
 / 1 J. The act of Henry the Eighth for the trial of 
 treasons I do not mean to take away, but to confine it to 
 its proper bounds and original intention ; to make it 
 expressly for trial of treasons (and the greatest treasons 
 
 15 may be committed) in places where the jurisdiction of the 
 crown does not extend. 
 
 114. Having guarded the privileges of local legis- 
 lature, I would next secure to the colonies a fair and 
 unbiased judicature; for which purpose, Sir, I propose 
 
 20 the following resolution : — 
 
 That, from the time when the general assembly, or general 
 court, of any colony or plantation in North America shall have 
 appointed by act of assembly duly confirmed, a settled salary to 
 the offices of the chief justice and other judges of the superior 
 
 25 court, it may be proper that the said chief justice and other judges 
 
 of the superior courts of such colony shall hold his and their office 
 
 and offices during their good behavior, and shall not be removed 
 
 t therefrom but when the said removal shall be adjudged by his 
 
 Majesty in council, upon a hearing on complaint from the general 
 
 30 assembly, or on a complaint from the governor or council or the 
 house of representatives, severally, of the colony in which the said 
 chief justice and other judges have exercised the said offices. 
 
66 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 115. The next resolution relates to the courts of 
 admiralty. It is this : — 
 
 That it may be proper to regulate the courts of admiralty or 
 vice-admiralty authorized by the fifteenth chapter of the fourth of 
 George the Third, in such a manner as to make the same more 5 
 commodious to those who sue or are sued in the said courts; and 
 to provide for the more decent maintenance of the judges in the 
 same. 
 
 1 16. These courts I do not wish to take away : they 
 are in themselves proper establishments. This court is 10 
 one of the capital securities of the Act of Navigation. 
 The extent of its jurisdiction, indeed, has been increased ; 
 but this is altogether as proper, and is indeed on 
 many accounts more eligible, where new powers were 
 wanted, than a court absolutely new. But courts incom- 15 
 modiously situated in effect den* justice ; and a court 
 partaking in the fruits of its own condemnation is a 
 robber. The Congress complain, and complain justly, 
 
 of this grievance. 
 
 1 1 j. These are the three consequential propositions. 20 
 I have thought of two or three more ; but they come 
 rather too near detail and to the province of executive 
 government, which I wish Parliament always to superin- 
 tend, never to assume. If the first six are granted, con- 
 gruity will carry the latter three. If not, the things that 25 
 remain unrepealed will be, I hope, rather unseemly in- 
 cumbrances on the building than very materially detri- 
 mental to its strength and stability. 
 
 / 18. Here, Sir, I should close ; but I plainly perceive 
 some" objections remain, which I ought, if possible, to 30 
 remove. The first will be that, in resorting to the 
 
SANCTION FOR RESOLUTIONS. 67 
 
 doctrine of our ancestors as contained in the preamble to 
 the Chester Act, I prove too much ; that the grievance 
 from a want of representation, stated in that preamble, 
 goes to the whole of legislation as well as to taxation ; 
 5 and that the colonies, grounding themselves upon that 
 doctrine, will apply it to all parts of legislative authority. 
 lig. To this objection, with all possible deference and 
 humility, and wishing as little as any man living to im- 
 pair the smallest particle of our supreme authority, I . 
 10 answer that the words are the words of Parliament \ and i *~K**^ 
 not mine ; and that all false and inconclusive inferences **«* <Ly~>~- 
 drawn from them are not mine, for I heartily disclaim ^T7j^2^ 
 any such inference. I have chosen the words of an act ^Jc£ £j<^< 
 of Parliament which Mr. Grenville, surely a tolerably ~ **^(f ' 
 zealous and very judicious advocate for the sovereignty of £^.-{£ 
 a Parliament, formerly moved to have read at vour table in^*^r^ V 
 I confirmation of his tenets .^ It is true that Lord Chatham <£*fi^~*U~y 
 
 considered these preambles as declaring strongl y in favo r ^^7^ £^ 
 ^ of his opinion s. He was a no less powerful advocate for^^a^. <£*. 
 20 the privileges of the Americans. Ought I not from ■ y *** i f* u4 ' 4? **■ 
 
 hence to presume that these preambles ar-e^as favorable a s (>~i4- < £j£. 
 ^ possible to both, when properly understood, — favorable^^^^***^*: 
 * both to the rights of Parliament and to the privilege o^ <#j£*^ 
 ^ the dependencies of this crown ? But, Sir, the object of *. Vw**~ «4 
 ^5 grievance in my resolution I have not taken from the 
 Chester, but from the Durham Act, which confines the 
 hardship of want of representation to the case of sub- 
 sidies, and which therefore falls in exactly with the case . J L* 
 of the colonies. But whether the unrepresented counties ^^-Sd. ^ 
 £30 were de jure or de facto b ound, the preambles do not ac- (^j fLc~+f 
 ^ curately distinguish ; nor indeed was it necessary ; for *-*• **%5^J% 
 "^ whether de jure or de facto, the legislature thought tht^^p^h. • 
 
68 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 exercise of the power of taxing, as of right or as of fact 
 without right, equally a grievance and equally oppressive. 
 120. I do not know that the colonies have, in any 
 general way or in any cool hour, gone much beyond the 
 demand of immuni ty in relation to taxes. It is not fair 5 
 to judge of the temper or disposition of any man or any 
 set of men, when they are composed and at rest, from 
 their conduct or their expressions in a state of disturb- 
 ance and irritation. It is, besides, a very great mistake to 
 ^j imagine that mankind follow up practically any speculative 10 
 «-• w*-4LUP rnlc ipl e > either of government or of freedom, as far as it 
 II ^i «u will go in argument and logica l illation . We Englishmen 
 •«*-*-•*■< stop very short of the principles upon which we support any 
 given part of our Constitution, or even the whole of it 
 together. I could easily, if I had not already tired you, 15 
 give you very striking and convincing instances of it. 
 This is nothing but what is natural and proper. All 
 government, indeed every human benefit and enjoyment, 
 every virtue, and every prudent act, is founded on com- 
 promise and barter. We balance inconveniences; we 20 
 give and take ; we remit some rights that we may enjoy 
 others ; and we choose rather to be happy citizens than 
 subtle disputants. As we must give away some natural 
 liberty to enjoy civil advantages, so we must sacrifice 
 some civil liberties for the advantages to be derived from 25 
 the communion and fellowship of a great empire. But in 
 all fair dealings the thing bought must bear some pro- 
 portion to the purchase paid. None will barter away the 
 immediate jewel of his soul. Though a great house is 
 apt to make slaves haughty, yet it is purchasing a part of 30 
 the artificial importance of a great empire too dear to pay 
 for it all essential rights and all the intrinsic dignity of 
 
INDULGENCE WILL CURE REBELLION 69 
 
 human nature. None of us who would not risk his life , 
 rather than fall under a government purely arbitrary. 
 But although there are some amongst us who think our 
 Constitution wants many improvements to make it a com- 
 5 plete system of liberty, perhaps none who are of that 
 opinion would think it right to aim at such improvement 
 by disturbing his country and risking everything that is 
 dear to him. In every arduous enterprise we consider 
 what we are to lose as well as what we are to gain ; and 
 
 10 the more and better stake of liberty every people possess, 
 the less they will hazard in a vain attempt to make it*- 
 more. These are the cords of man. Man acts from 
 adequate motives relative to his interest, and not on 
 metaphysical speculations. Aristotle, the great master of 
 
 15 reasoning, cautions us, and with great weight and 
 propriety, against this species of delusive geometrical ac- 
 curacy in moral arguments, as the most fallacious of all 
 sophistry. 
 
 121 . The Americans will have no interest contrary to 
 
 20 the grandeur and glory of England, when they are not 
 oppressed by the weight of it ; and they will rather be 
 inclined to respect the acts of a superintending legislature, 
 when they see them the acts of that power which is itself 
 the security, not the rival, of their secondary impor- 
 
 25 t?nce. In this assurance my mind most perfectly ac- 
 quiesces ; and I confess I feel not the least alarm from the 
 discontents which are to arise from putting people at their 
 ease • nor do I apprehend the destruction of this empire 
 from giving, by an act of free grace and indulgence, to 
 (30 two millions of my fellow-citizens, some share of those 
 rights upon which I have always been taught to value 
 myself. 
 
70 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 122. It is said, indeed, that this power of granting, 
 vested in American assemblies, would dissolve the unity 
 of the empire, which was preserved entire, although 
 Wales and Chester and Durham were added to it. 
 Truly, Mr. Speaker, I do not know what this unity 5 
 means ; nor has it ever been heard of, that I know, in 
 the constitutional policy of this country. The very idea 
 of subordination of parts excludes this notion of simple 
 and undivided unity. England is the head, but she is 
 not the head and the members too. Ireland has ever 10 
 had from the beginning a separate, but not an independ- 
 ent, legislature, which, far from distracting, promoted 
 the union of the whole. Everything was sweetly and 
 harmoniously disposed through both islands for the con- 
 servation of English dominion and the communication of 15 
 English liberties. I do not see that the same principles 
 might not be carried into twenty islands, and with the 
 same good effect. This is my model with regard to 
 America, as far as the internal circumstances of the two 
 countries are the same. I know no other unity of this 20 
 empire than I can draw from its example during these 
 periods when it seemed to my poor understanding more 
 united than it is now, or than it is likely to be by the 
 present methods. 
 
 123. But since I speak of these methods, I recollect, 25 
 Mr. Speaker, almost too late, that I promised, before 1 
 finished, to say something of the proposition of the noble 
 lord on the floor, which has been so lately received, and 
 stands on your journals. I must be deeply concerned 
 whenever it is my misfortune to continue a difference 30 
 with the majority of this House. But as the reasons for 
 that difference are my apology for thus troubling you, 
 
E VI L S OF RANSOM BY A UCTION. 7 1 
 
 suffer me to state them in a very few words. I shall 
 compress them into as small a body as I possibly can, 
 having already debated that matter at large when the 
 question was before the committee. 
 5 124. First, then, I cannot admit that proposition of 
 a ransom by auction, because it is a mere project. It is 
 a thing new, unheard of, supported by no experience, 
 justified by no analogy, without example of our ancestors 
 or root in the Constitution. It is neither regular parlia- 
 
 10 mentary taxation nor colony grant. Experimentwn in 
 corpore vili is a good rule, which will ever make me 
 adverse to any trial of experiments on what is certainly 
 the most valuable of all subjects, — the peace of this 
 empire. 
 
 15 725. Secondly, it is an experiment which must be 
 fatal in the end to our Constitution. For what is it but a 
 scheme for taxing the colonies in the antechamber of the 
 noble lord and his successors ? To settle the quotas and 
 proportions in this House is clearly impossible. You, 
 
 20 Sir, may flatter yourself you shall sit a state auctioneer 
 with your hammer in your hand, and knock down to 
 each colony as it bids. But to settle (on the plan laid 
 down by the noble lord) the true proportional payment 
 for four or five and twenty governments, according to the 
 
 25 absolute and the relative wealth of each, and according 
 to the British proportion of wealth and burden, is a wild 
 and chimerical notion. This new taxation must there- 
 fore come in by the back door of the Constitution. 
 Each quota must be brought to this House ready 
 
 30 formed. You can neither add nor alter. You must 
 register it. You can do nothing further. For on what 
 grounds can you deliberate either before or after the 
 
72 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 proposition ? You cannot hear the counsel for all these 
 provinces, quarrelling each on its own quantity of pay- 
 ment and its proportion to others. If you should at- 
 tempt it, the committee of provincial ways and means, 
 or by whatever other name it will delight to be called, 5 
 must swallow up all the time of Parliament. 
 
 126. Thirdly, it does not give satisfaction to the 
 complaint of the colonies. They complain that they are 
 taxed without their consent ; you answer that you will 
 fix the sum at which they shall be taxed. That is, you 10 
 give them the very grievance for the remedy. You tell 
 them, indeed, that you will leave the mode to themselves. 
 I really beg pardon ; it gives me pain to mention it ; but 
 you must be sensible that you will not perform this part 
 of the compact. For suppose the colonies were to lay 15 
 the duties which furnished their contingent upon the im- 
 portation of your manufactures, you know you would 
 never suffer such a tax to be laid. You know, too, that 
 you would not suffer many other modes of taxation. So 
 that when you come to explain yourself, it will be found 20 
 that you will neither leave to themselves the quantum 
 nor the mode; nor indeed anything. The whole is 
 delusion from one end to the other. 
 
 I2y. Fourthly, this method of ransom by auction, 
 unless it be universally accepted, will plunge you into 25 
 great and inextricable difficulties. In what year of our 
 Lord are the proportions of payments to be settled ? To 
 say nothing of the impossibility that colony agents should 
 have general powers of taxing the colonies at their dis- 
 cretion, consider, I implore you, that the communication 30 
 by special messages and orders between these agents and 
 their constituents on each variation of the case, when 
 
DIFFICULTIES OF THE PROJECT. 73 
 
 the parties come to contend together and to dispute on 
 their relative proportions, will be a matter of delay, 
 perplexity and confusion that never can have an end. 
 128. If all the colonies do not appear at the outcry, 
 5 what is the condition of those assemblies who offer, by 
 themselves or their agents, to tax themselves up to your 
 ideas of their proportion ? The refractory colonies who 
 refuse all composition will remain taxed only to your old 
 impositions, which, however grievous in principle, are 
 
 10 trifling as to production. The obedient colonies in this 
 scheme are heavily taxed ; the refractory remain unbur- 
 dened. What will you do? Will you lay new and 
 heavier taxes by Parliament on the disobedient ? Pray 
 consider in what way you can do it. You are perfectly 
 
 15 convinced that in the way of taxing you can do nothing 
 but at the ports. Now suppose it is Virginia that refuses 
 to appear at your auction, while Maryland and North 
 Carolina bid handsomely for their ransom, and are taxed 
 to your quota, how will you put these colonies on a par? 
 
 20 Will you tax the tobacco of Virginia ? If you do, you 
 give its death-wound to your English revenue at home 
 and to one of the very greatest articles of your own 
 foreign trade. If you tax the import of that rebellious 
 colony, what do you tax but your own manufactures or 
 
 25 the goods of some other obedient and already well-taxed 
 colony? Who has said one word on this labyrinth of 
 detail which bewilders you more and more as you enter 
 into it ? Who has presented, who can present you with 
 a clue to lead you out of it ? I think, Sir, it is impos- 
 
 30 sible that you should not recollect that the colony bounds 
 are so implicated in one another (you know it by your 
 other experiments in the bill for prohibiting the New 
 
74 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 England fishery) that you can lay no possible restraints 
 on almost any of them which may not be presently 
 eluded, if you do not confound the innocent with the 
 guilty, and burden those whom, upon every principle, 
 you ought to exonerate. He must be grossly ignorant 5 
 of America who thinks that, without falling into this con- 
 fusion of all rules of equity and policy, you can restrain 
 any single colony, especially Virginia and Maryland, the 
 central and most important of them all. 
 
 129. Let it also be considered that, either in the 10 
 present confusion you settle a permanent contingent, 
 which will and must be trifling, and then you have no 
 effectual revenue ; or you change the quota at every 
 exigency, and then on every new repartition you will 
 have a new quarrel. 15 
 
 130. Reflect besides, that when you have fixed a 
 quota for every colony, you have not provided for 
 prompt and punctual payment. Suppose one, two, five, 
 ten years' arrears. You cannot issue a treasury extent 
 against the failing colony. You must make new Boston 20 
 Port Bills, new restraining laws, new acts for dragging 
 men to England for trial. You must send out new fleets, 
 new armies. All is to begin again. From this day for- 
 ward the empire is never to know an hour's tranquillity. 
 An intestine fire will be kept alive in the bowels of the 25 
 colonies, which one time or other must consume this 
 whole empire. I allow indeed that the empire of Ger- 
 many raises her revenue and her troops by quotas and 
 contingents; but the revenue of the empire and the 
 army of the empire is the worst revenue and the worst 30 
 army in the world. 
 
 IJI. Instead of standing revenue, you will therefore 
 
TWO PLANS CONTRASTED. 75 
 
 have a perpetual quarrel. Indeed, the noble lord who 
 proposed this project of a ransom by auction seemed 
 himself to be of that opinion. His project was rather 
 designed for breaking the union of the colonies than for 
 5 establishing a revenue. He confessed he apprehended 
 that his proposal would not be to their taste. I say this 
 scheme of disunion seems to be at the bottom of the proj- 
 ect ; for I will not suspect that the noble lord meant 
 nothing but merely to delude the nation by an airy 
 
 10 phantom which he never intended to realize. But what- 
 ever his views may be, as I propose the peace and union 
 of the colonies as the very foundation of my plan, it can- 
 not accord with one whose foundation is perpetual dis- 
 cord. 
 
 15 132. Compare the two. This I offer to give you is 
 plain and simple ; the other full of perplexed and intri- 
 cate mazes. This is mild ; that harsh. This is found 
 by experience effectual for its purposes ; the other is a 
 new project. This is universal ; the other calculated for 
 
 20 certain colonies only. This is immediate in its concilia- 
 tory operation ; the other remote, contingent, full of 
 hazard. Mine is what becomes the dignity of a ruling 
 people, — gratuitous, unconditional, and not held out as a 
 matter of bargain and sale. I have done my duty in 
 
 25 proposing it to you. I have indeed tired you by a long 
 discourse ; but this is the misfortune of those to whose 
 influence nothing will be conceded, and who must win 
 every inch of their ground by argument. You have 
 heard me with goodness. May you decide with wisdom ! 
 
 30 For my part, I feel my mind greatly disburdened by what 
 I have done to-day. I have been the less fearful of try- 
 ing your patience, because on this subject I mean to spare 
 
j6 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 it altogether in future. I have this comfort, that in every 
 stage of the American affairs I have steadily opposed the 
 measures that have produced the confusion, and may 
 bring on the destruction, of this empire. I now go so 
 far as to risk a proposal of my own. If I cannot give 5 
 peace to my country, I give it to my conscience. 
 
 1 33. "But what," says the financier, " is peace to us 
 without money ? Your plan gives us no revenue." No ! 
 But it does ; for it secures to the subject the power of 
 REFUSAL, the first of all revenues. Experience is a 10 
 cheat and fact a liar, if this power in the subject of pro- 
 portioning his grant, or of not granting at all, has not 
 been found the richest mine of revenue ever discovered 
 by the skill or by the fortune of man. It does not in- 
 deed vote you ,£152,750 iu. 2^ths, nor any other 15 
 paltry limited sum; but it gives the strong-box itself, the 
 fund, the bank, from whence only revenues can arise 
 amongst a people sensible of freedom : Posita luditur 
 area. Cannot you in England, cannot you at this time 
 of day, cannot you, an House of Commons, trust to the 20 
 principle which has raised so mighty a revenue and ac- 
 cumulated a debt of near 140 millions in this country ? 
 Is this principle to be true in England and false every- 
 where else? Is it not true in Ireland? Has it not 
 hitherto been true in the colonies? Why should you 25 
 presume that in any country a body duly constituted for 
 any function will neglect to perform its duty and abdicate 
 its trust? Such a presumption would go against all 
 governments in all modes. But in truth this dread of 
 penury of supply from a free assembly has no foundation 30 
 in nature. For first observe, that besides the desire 
 which all men have naturally of supporting the honor of 
 
FREEDOM THE GREATEST OF REVENUES. 77 
 
 their own government, that sense of dignity and that 
 security to property which ever attends freedom has a 
 tendency to increase the stock of the free community. 
 Most may be taken where most is accumulated. And 
 5 what is the soil or climate where experience has not uni- 
 formly proved that the voluntary flow of heaped-up 
 plenty, bursting from the weight on its own rich luxuri- 
 ance, has ever run with a more copious stream of revenue 
 than could be squeezed from the dry husks of oppressed 
 
 10 indigence by the straining of all the politic machinery in 
 the world ? 
 
 134. Next, we know that parties must ever exist in a 
 free country. We know, too, that the emulations of 
 such parties, their contradictions, their reciprocal neces- 
 
 15 sities, their hopes and their fears, must send them all in 
 their turns to him that holds the balance of the state. 
 The parties are the gamesters ; but government keeps the 
 table, and is sure to be the winner in the end. When 
 this game is played, I really think it is more to be feared 
 
 20 that the people will be exhausted than that government 
 will not be supplied. W'hereas, whatever is got by acts 
 of absolute power, ill obeyed because odious, or by con- 
 tracts ill kept because constrained, will be narrow, feeble, 
 uncertain and precarious. 
 
 -'5 
 
 Ease would retract 
 Vows made in pain, as violent and void. 
 
 / 55. I, for one, protest against compounding our de- 
 mands. I declare against compounding for a poor limited 
 sum the immense, ever-growing, eternal debt which is 
 30 due to generous government from protected freedom. 
 And so may I speed in the great object I propose to you, 
 
78 ON CONCILIA TION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 as I think it would not only be an act of injustice, but 
 would be the worst economy in the world, to compel the 
 colonies to a sum certain, either in the way of ransom or 
 in the way of compulsory compact. 
 
 1^6. But to clear up my ideas on this subject, — a 5 
 revenue from America transmitted hither, — do not delude 
 yourselves : you never can receive it, — no, not a shilling. 
 We have experience that from remote countries it is not 
 to be expected. If, when you attempted to extract reve- 
 nue from Bengal, you were obliged to return in loan what 10 
 you had taken in imposition, what can you expect from 
 North America? For certainly, if ever there was a 
 country qualified to produce wealth, it is India ; or an 
 institution for the transmission, it is the East India Com- 
 pany. America has none of these aptitudes. If America 15 
 gives you taxable objects on which you lay your duties 
 here, and gives you at the same time a surplus by a 
 foreign sale of her commodities to pay the duties on these 
 objects which you tax at home, she has performed her 
 part to the British revenue. But with regard to her own 20 
 internal establishments, she may, — I doubt not she will, 
 — contribute in moderation. I say in moderation; for 
 she ought not to be permitted to exhaust herself. She 
 ought to be reserved to a war, the weight of which, with 
 the enemies that we are most likely to have, must be con- 25 
 siderable in her quarter of the globe. There she may 
 serve you, and serve you essentially. 
 
 137. For that service, for all service, whether of reve- 
 nue, trade or empire, my trust is in her interest in the British 
 Constitution. My hold of the colonies is in the close 30 
 affection which grows from common names, from kindred 
 blood, from similar privileges and equal protection. 
 
TRUE NATURE OF EMPIRE. 79 
 
 These are ties which, though light as air, are as strong as 
 links of iron. Let the colonies always keep the idea of 
 their civil rights associated with your government, — they 
 will cling and grapple to you, and no force under heaven 
 5 will be of power to tear them from their allegiance. But 
 let it be once understood that your government may be 
 one thing and their privileges another ; that these two 
 things may exist without any mutual relation, the cement 
 is gone, the cohesion is loosened and everything hastens 
 
 10 to decay and dissolution. As long as you have the wis- 
 dom to keep the sovereign authority of this country as 
 the sanctuary of liberty, the sacred temple consecrated to 
 our common faith, wherever the chosen race and sons of 
 England worship freedom, they will turn their faces to- 
 
 15 wards you. The more they multiply, the more friends 
 you will have ; the more ardently they love liberty, the 
 more perfect will be their obedience. Slavery they can 
 have anywhere. It is a weed that grows in every soil. 
 They may have it from Spain ; they may have it from 
 
 20 Prussia. But until you become lost to all feeling of your 
 true interest and your natural dignity, freedom they can 
 have from none but you. This is the commodity of 
 price, of which you have the monopoly. This is the true 
 Act of Navigation which binds to you the commerce of 
 
 25 the colonies, and through them secures to you the wealth 
 of the world. Deny them this participation of freedom, 
 and you break that sole bond which originally made and 
 must still preserve the unity of the empire. Do not en- 
 tertain so weak an imagination as that your registers and 
 
 30 your bonds, your affidavits and your sufferances, your 
 cockets and your clearances, are what form the great 
 securities of your commerce. Do not dream that your 
 
8o ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 letters of office and your instructions and your suspend- 
 ing clauses are the things that hold together the great 
 contexture of the mysterious whole. These things do 
 not make your government. Dead instruments, passive 
 tools as they are, it is the spirit of the English comraun- 5 
 ion that gives all their life and efficacy to them. It is the 
 spirit of the English Constitution, which, infused through 
 the mighty mass, pervades, feeds, unites, invigorates, 
 vivifies every part of the empire, even down to the mi- 
 nutest member. 10 
 
 Ij8. Is it not the same virtue which does everything 
 for us here in England ? Do you imagine, then, that it 
 is the Land Tax Act which raises your revenue ? that it 
 is the annual vote in the Committee of Supply which 
 gives you your army? or that it is the Mutiny Bill which 15 
 inspires it with bravery and discipline ? No ! surely no ! 
 It is the love of the people ; it is their attachment to their 
 government, from the sense of the deep stake they have 
 in such a glorious institution, which gives you your army 
 and your navy, and infuses into both that liberal obedience 20 
 without which your army would be a base rabble, and 
 your navy nothing but rotten timber. 
 
 Ijp. All this, I know well enough, will sound wild 
 and chimerical to the profane herd of those vulgar and 
 mechanical politicians who have no place among us, — a 25 
 sort of people who think that nothing exists but what is 
 gross and material ; and who, therefore, far from being 
 qualified to be directors of the great movement of em- 
 pire, are not fit to turn a wheel in the machine. But to 
 men truly initiated and rightly taught, these ruling and 30 
 master principles, which in the opinion of such men as I 
 have mentioned have no substantial existence, are in truth 
 
SURSUM CORD A! 81 
 
 everything and all in all. Magnanimity in politics is not 
 seldom the truest wisdom ; and a great empire and little 
 minds go ill together. If we are conscious of our station, 
 and glow with zeal to fill our places as becomes our situa- 
 
 5 tion and ourselves, we ought to auspicate all our public 
 proceedings on America with the old warning of the 
 Church, Sursum cor da / We ought to elevate our minds 
 to the greatness of that trust to which the order of Provi- 
 dence has called us. By adverting to the dignity of this 
 
 10 high calling, our ancestors have turned a savage wilder- 
 ness into a glorious empire ; and have made the most ex- 
 tensive, and the only honorable conquests, not by de- 
 stroying, but by promoting the wealth, the number, the 
 happiness of the human race. Let us get an American 
 
 15 revenue as we have got an American empire. English 
 privileges have made it all that it is; English privileges 
 alone will make it all it can be. 
 
 140. In full confidence of this unalterable truth, I 
 now {quod felix faustumque sit f) lay the first stone of 
 
 20 the Temple of Peace ; and I move you, — 
 
 That the colonies and plantations of Great Britain in North 
 America, consisting of fourteen separate governments, and con- 
 taining two millions and upwards of free inhabitants, have not had 
 the liberty and privilege of electing and sending any knights and 
 25 burgesses, or others, to represent them in the high court of Parlia- 
 ment. 
 
 Upon this resolution the previous question was put and 
 carried : for the previous* question, 270 ; against it, 78. 
 
 As the propositions were opened separately in the body 
 
 30 of the speech, the reader perhaps may wish to see the 
 
 whole of them together in the form in which they were 
 
82 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 moved for. The first four motions and the last had the 
 previous question put on them. The others were nega- 
 tived. The words in italics were, by an amendment that 
 was carried, left out of the motion ; which will appear in 
 the journals, though it is not the practice to insert such 5 
 amendments in the votes. 
 
 Moved, 
 
 That the colonies and plantations of Great Britain in North 
 America, consisting of fourteen separate governments, and con- 
 taining two millions and upwards of free inhabitants, have not had 10 
 the liberty and privilege of electing and sending any knights and 
 burgesses, or others, to represent them in the high court of Parlia- 
 ment. 
 
 That the said colonies and plantations have been liable to, and 
 bounden by, several subsidies, payments, rates and taxes, given 15 
 and granted by Parliament, though the said colonies and planta- 
 tions have not their knights and burgesses in the said high court 
 of Parliament, of their own election, to represent the condition of 
 their country ; by lack whereof they have been oftentimes toucJied 
 and grieved by subsidies given, granted and assented to, in the said 20 
 cotirt, in a manner prejudicial to the commonwealth, quietness, rest 
 and peace of the subjects inhabiting within the same. 
 
 That, from the distance of the said colonies and from other 
 circumstances, no method hath hitherto been devised for procuring 
 a representation in Parliament for the said colonies. 25 
 
 That each of the said colonies hath within itself a body, chosen 
 in part or in the whole by the freemen, freeholders or other free 
 inhabitants thereof, commonly called the general assembly, or gen- 
 eral court ; with powers legally to raise, levy and assess, according 
 ' to the several usages of such colonies, duties and taxes towards 30 
 defraying all sorts of public services. 
 
 That the said general assemblies, general courts, or other bodies 
 legally qualified as aforesaid, have at sundry times freely granted 
 
THE RESOLUTIONS. 83 
 
 several large subsidies and public aids for his Majesty's service, 
 according to their abilities, when required thereto by letter from 
 one of his Majesty's principal secretaries of state ; and that their 
 right to grant the same and their cheerfulness and sufficiency in the 
 5 said grants have been at sundry times acknowledged by Parliament. 
 
 That it hath been found by experience that the manner of grant- 
 ing the said supplies and aids by the said general assemblies hath 
 been more agreeable to the said colonies, and more beneficial and 
 conducive to the public service, than the mode of giving and grant- 
 10 ing aids in Parliament, to be raised and paid in the said colonies. 
 
 That it may be proper to repeal an act made in the seventh year 
 of the reign of his present Majesty, entitled, " An act for granting 
 certain duties in the British colonies and plantations in America ; 
 for allowing a drawback of the duties of customs upon the expor- 
 15 tation from this kingdom, of coffee and cocoanuts of the produce 
 of the said colonies or plantations ; for discontinuing the draw- 
 backs payable on China earthenware exported to America ; and 
 for more effectually preventing the clandestine running of goods in 
 the said colonies and plantations." 
 
 20 That it may be proper to repeal an act made in the fourteenth 
 year of the reign of his present Majesty, entitled, "An act to discon- 
 tinue, in such manner and for such time as are therein mentioned, 
 the landing and discharging, lading or shipping, of goods, wares 
 and merchandise, at the town and within the harbor of Boston, in 
 
 25 the province of Massachusetts Bay, in North America." 
 
 That it may be proper to repeal an act made in the fourteenth 
 year of the reign of his present Majesty, entitled, " An act for the 
 impartial administration of justice in the cases of persons questioned 
 for any acts done by them in the execution of the law, or for the 
 20 suppression of riots and tumults, in the province of Massachusetts 
 Bay, in New England." 
 
 That it may be proper to repeal an act made in the fourteenth 
 
84 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 year of the reign of his present Majesty, entitled, " An act for the 
 better regulating the government of the province of the Massa- 
 chusetts Bay, in New England." 
 
 That it may be proper to explain and amend an act made in the 
 thirty-fifth year of the reign of King Henry the Eighth, entitled, 5 
 " An act for the trial of treasons committed out of the king's 
 dominions." 
 
 That from the time when the general assembly, or general court, 
 of any colony or plantation in North America shall have appointed 
 by act of assembly duly confirmed, a settled salary to the offices of io 
 the chief justice and other judges of the superior court, it may be 
 proper that the said chief justice and other judges of the superior 
 courts of such colony shall hold his and their office and offices 
 during their good behavior, and shall not be removed therefrom 
 but when the said removal shall be adjudged by his Majesty in 15 
 council, upon a hearing on complaint from the general assembly, 
 or on a complaint from the governor or council or the house of rep- 
 resentatives, severally, of the colony in which the said chief justice 
 and other judges have exercised the said offices. 
 
 That it may be proper to regulate the courts of admiralty or 20 
 vice-admiralty authorized by the fifteenth chapter of the fourth, of 
 George the Third, in such a manner as to make the same more 
 commodious to those who sue or are sued in the said courts ; and 
 to provide for the more decent maintenance of the judges in the 
 same. 2 z 
 
NOTES 
 
 I. Every consideration calls upon us for care in 
 dealing with America. 
 
 I : i. Austerity of the Chair is a formal expression, having no 
 personal reference to Sir Fletcher Norton, who was Speaker, — a 
 man petulant rather than austere. Burke wishes to ingratiate him- 
 self with the House by complimenting it in the person of its chair- 
 man. 
 
 I : 3. Human frailty : One of many examples in the speech* 
 of humility assumed for the sake of oratorical effect. 
 
 Oratorical egotism — the assumption of humility or its opposite, 
 complacency, in addressing an audience — was characteristic of De- 
 mosthenes and Cicero. Burke and other British orators of what 
 might now be called the " old school," were proud to adopt what 
 they regarded as an elegant and useful practice. Cicero was, in a 
 special sense, Burke's model. 
 
 1:8. To my infinite surprise, etc., is evidence that the intro- 
 ductory paragraph was unpremeditated. The speech as a whole 
 was extempore in form, though of course in substance it had been 
 most carefully studied. It was written out and edited by Burke 
 himself for publication. 
 
 The grand penal bill : Burke's name for a measure which had 
 been proposed by Lord North, February 10, 1775, s * x wee ks before 
 Burke delivered the present speech. The New England colonies, 
 especially Massachusetts, were to be punished for the obstinate op- 
 position they had shown towards England's recent efforts to regu- 
 late their commerce. England had insisted that she had the right 
 to control the importation of tea into the colonies. The opposition 
 aroused by this claim was intensified by other acts of Parliament, 
 such as quartering troops upon the colonists, interfering with the 
 judiciary of Massachusetts, and annulling her charter. On the 
 
 85 
 
86 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA 
 
 other hand, the colonists were so adroit in eluding the grasp of Par- 
 liament, and so united in an increasingly bold course of opposition, 
 that the king and his chief adviser thought it now high time to ad- 
 minister severe and sweeping discipline. They proposed by this 
 grand penal bill, to confine the trade of the New England colonies 
 to Great Britain, Ireland and the British West Indies ; and to re- 
 strict their fishing privileges on the Grand Banks. 
 
 Throughout the six weeks preceding the speech on Conciliation, 
 Burke had fought this bill on two grounds, — justice to the colonies 
 and profit to English trade and revenue. When Lord North ar- 
 gued that New England must be made obedient, Burke answered 
 that this bill was an absurd means to such an end, for at best it 
 would preserve only the forms of government, and these at the ex- 
 pense of the liberty and contentment of the governed. Burke 
 also showed that to suspend the trade of the colonists would render 
 them unable to pay their debts to English creditors. Finally, on 
 the 8th of May, protesting against the passage of the bill, he re- 
 marked in sarcastic desperation, — This bill " does not mean to shed 
 blood ; but to suit some gentleman's humanity, it only means to 
 starve five hundred thousand people." 
 
 The speech on Conciliation is really a part of Burke's fight against 
 this " grand penal bill," and another similar piece of Lord North's 
 statesmanship. The peculiar strength of Burke's opposition con- 
 sists in the wisdom of the policy he proposed as substitute for that 
 which he attacked. But, though it was not yet known in England, 
 neither wise nor foolish legislation was of much avail when the 
 penal bill was passed, for the battles of Lexington and Concord 
 had been fought three weeks before. 
 
 I : io. Returned to us from the other house : with the request 
 to amend it so as to include New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, 
 Virginia and South Carolina ! 
 
 I : 1 6. By the return, etc. : Burke tries to persuade an indif- 
 ferent house to face the American problem in a serious spirit. 
 
 2. I feel an oppressive responsibility regarding the 
 imperial policy towards the colonies. 
 
 2:5. When I first, etc. : 1 766, in time to help repeal the 
 Stamp Act. 
 
NOTES. 87 
 
 2:12. To take more than common pains, etc. : Here is humility 
 employed to inspire earnest attention on the part of his hearers. 
 But there is no reason to suppose they saw the point of Burke's re- 
 marks. Probably the closing sentence of the paragraph appealed 
 to a few. Burke had really labored to learn all there was to be 
 known about America, with a success that is evident on every page 
 of this speech. 
 
 2:15. General policy of the British Empire : Burke was the 
 first practical British statesman to formulate a system of political 
 economy in its broadest sense, — the principles of imperial govern- 
 ment. 
 
 j. The position I took in ij66Jias not changed. 
 
 2 : 25. A large majority : The Stamp Act was repealed by a 
 vote of 275 to 161. 
 
 4. The vacillation of Parliament has caused inde- 
 scribable complications in American affairs. 
 
 3 : 1. An enlarged view over the vast area of special interests, 
 not American, which were guarded by the members of Parliament. 
 
 5. Mr. Fuller persuaded me that the oppositioii must 
 take the offensive. 
 
 3:18. A worthy member : Mr. Rose Fuller, who moved to re-'' 
 peal the Tea Tax, April 19, 1774, when Burke delivered his speech 
 on American Taxation. 
 
 3 : 22. Our politics : of Burke's party. 
 
 3 : 24. The public tribunal : popular sentiment, in which alone 
 lay Burke's hope of success. 
 
 6. I drew tip resolutions, but hesitated to present 
 them. 
 
 4 : 15. Gave so far into, etc. : yielded to the extent of formu- 
 lating resolutions. Now, five months later, they are produced. 
 
 4 : 22. Disreputably : with danger to one's reputation. Burke 
 hopes to disarm prejudice by emphasizing his hesitancy. 
 
 7. Public welfare now demands their presentation. 
 4 : 27. Paper government : theory severed from practice, such 
 
 as Locke's adaptation of the feudal system for the government of 
 North Carolina. 
 
88 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 It is not to be supposed that Burke regarded his resolutions as 
 theoretical, but that he feared lest they should be so regarded by 
 others. He hopes to inspire confidence by overstating his own 
 caution. 
 
 8. My own insignificance has made me bold. 
 
 5:14. Judging of what you are, etc. : a high standard for the 
 best of men, entirely too high for the parliament to which Burke 
 spoke. Yet we are not to suppose him blind to their ignorance or 
 duplicity. He overstates their merit, hoping thus to make them 
 rise towards his position. This is a kind of optimism we see prac- 
 tised every day, and it is certainly true that the more good one ex- 
 pects to find, the more one is likely to find. 
 
 The degree of impartial good judgment Burke ascribes to the 
 House is really superhuman. No legislature accepts a proposi- 
 tion solely because it is reasonable, or rejects one solely because it 
 is futile or dangerous. The motives which actuate such bodies are 
 complex, and more or less selfish. Considering how unusually 
 corrupt and stupid was the present House, Burke must have smiled 
 to himself as he uttered the flattering lines, — " You will see it just 
 as it is, and you will treat it just as it deserves." 
 
 <?. My resolutions propose to reconcile America, by 
 restoring her former confidence in the mother country. 
 
 5 : 25. The proposition is peace : Here is the theme of the ora- 
 tion. This paragraph contains the key to every line of thought in 
 the speech* Note especially the line of destructive argument im- 
 plied in lines 25-32. 
 
 5'l 28. Universal discord fomented from principle : One of Lord 
 North's objects was to divide the colonies by jealousies so as to 
 simplify the problem of governing them. He even admitted in de- 
 bate that his policy was Divide et impera. 
 
 5:30. Juridical: according to the letter of the law, rather 
 than in a spirit of justice. 
 
 6 : 4. Former unsuspecting confidence, etc. : a phrase used by 
 the Continental Congress to describe the effect of the repeal of the 
 Stamp Act. Burke was struck by the expression, and used it not 
 only in this speech, but in his Letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol, — 
 
NOTES. 89 
 
 " This unsuspecting confidence is the true centre of gravity amongst 
 mankind, about which all the parts are at rest." 
 
 10. My plan is far simpler than the project of 
 Lord North. 
 
 6 : 10. Refined : elaborate. The general statements contained 
 in this and the two succeeding sentences are not theoretical, though 
 they have the appearance of being so. They are generalized from 
 actual human experience. They differ from theory as much as 
 observation differs from imagination. It is important to make this 
 distinction because throughout the speech Burke uses generaliza- 
 tions from fact and experience, and, at the same time, scouts the 
 use of mere theory. 
 
 6:19. Pruriency: itching, curiosity. 
 
 6:21. The project : Burke's name for Lord North's Proposi- 
 tions for Conciliating the Differences with America. 
 
 This project, together with the grand penal bill, forms the means 
 by which Lord North hoped to reduce America to submission. 
 The penal bill sought to punish the colonies for their opposition to 
 unfair restrictions upon trade ; while this project had for its 
 avowed object, the separation of the " reasonable from the unrea- 
 sonable," that is, of those who gave up all the natural rights of a 
 subject, from those who would not. ] It proposed that Parliament 
 should control the public funds of all the American colonies. King 
 and Parliament were to fix the proportion of funds for common de- 
 fence to be paid by each colony ; and to approve or disapprove the 
 amount each colony offered to subscribe for the support of its civil 
 and judicial system. If a colony came quietly to terms, offering a 
 subscription satisfactory to King and Parliament, these powers 
 would look upon it with friendly eyes, and, except in the way of 
 levying duties upon its importations into England, would not tax 
 it further. Herein lay the conciliatory feature of North's scheme. 
 But this bill was not merely a test of the subserviency of such 
 colonies as had not appeared restive ; it was, and Lord North so 
 planned it, a subtle means of producing jealousy and discord 
 among the colonies towards one another, which would render some 
 of the colonies the allies of England, in her punitive attitude to- 
 wards the rest. For instance, it was hoped that New York would 
 
go ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 join England against Massachusetts, and thus give a strong moral 
 support to the disciplinary acts of the mother country. 
 
 As a matter of fact, this sort of legislation had already worked 
 just the other way. The colonies had made common cause against 
 their common oppressor, and in this new emergency they took the 
 same course. All but Georgia sent representatives to Philadelphia 
 to protest against such " conciliatory " measures. 
 
 6 : 22. Noble lord in the blue ribbon : a conventional compli- 
 ment to Lord North, who was " noble lord " by courtesy only, his 
 father being still alive. It was thus he could hold a seat in the 
 lower house. He was a Knight of the Garter, and therefore was 
 entitled to wear as garter the blue ribbon embroidered, honi soil qui 
 mal y pense. 
 
 6 : 24. Colony agents : persons employed by the colonies to 
 look after their respective interests in Parliament. Burke was 
 agent for New York. 
 
 6 : 27. Auction of fin an ce : implies that the representatives of 
 the various colonies when ,they came to Parliament to settle the 
 proportion of payments called for in the project of Lord North, 
 would one after another keep on increasing their bids for royal 
 favor till the auctioneer, whoever that might be, should be satisfied 
 with their offers. 
 
 In such a scheme there are several elements of absurdity. 
 First, it would be very hard to determine the total sum to be 
 raised; second, it would be impossible justly to proportion this to 
 the abilities of the various colonies ; third, every concession on the 
 part of one colony would encourage a demand by Parliament for 
 corresponding concessions from all the others; finally, there was 
 no reason why they should make Parliament the arbiter of their 
 financial operations. Burke evidently uses the term " auction " to 
 cast ridicule upon a plan so elaborate as to be impracticable, and 
 one sure to beget jealousies among colonies bidding for the favor 
 of the King. 
 
 11. But Lord North 's avowed purpose of concili- 
 ating America is a great advantage to my motion. 
 
 7 : 2. The idea of conciliation is the nominal purpose of Lord 
 North's project. It suits Burke to regard this as his real desire. 
 
NOTES. 91 
 
 12. It is evident that Parliament is conscious of 
 error in its treatment of America. 
 
 7 : 21. Alien from all the ancient methods, etc. : modern usage 
 requires alien to. 
 
 Burke is to build his plan on conservative lines. The italics in 
 ^[ 9 indicate the same thing. 
 
 ij. Acting on North's principle, I intend to co?icili- 
 ate America, but by other means. 
 
 7 : 28. On the admitted principle : The remainder of the para- 
 graph is devoted to showing how the field looks from this ground. 
 
 7 : 29. Peace implies reconciliation : There is no distinction to 
 be taken account of between reconciliation here, and conciliation 
 as it is used in the title of the speech. 
 
 7 : 30. Material dispttte : a disagreement over tangible posses- 
 sions or specific rights. The word material generally means 
 merely important, but here has the force of excluding those dis- 
 putes in which the two parties might properly agree to disagree ; 
 as, for example, matters of taste, or faith. 
 
 8 : 2. Great and acknowledged force : A big Newfoundland is 
 respected the more because he forgives and .pities the yelping 
 puppy. Gulliver amongst the Lilliputians affords perhaps a better 
 parallel. 
 
 8 : 6. The concessions of the weak, etc. : This was just the chief 
 reason why the colonies would concede nothing to England. 
 
 14. The advisability of concession by England de- 
 pends on the nature and circumstances of the colonies. 
 
 8:12. The capital leading questions : Thus is introduced the 
 central topic of discussion. It has been said that a question well 
 asked is half answered. 
 
 8 : 15. We have gained some ground : referring of course to 
 the ostensibly conciliatory purpose of North's project. 
 
 8:21. The true nature and the peculiar circumstances : It 
 will be interesting to see whether Burke divides his study of the 
 American problem according to these heads, or whether he is 
 vaguely using two terms when the first would be enough alone. 
 
92 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 Compare the closing sentence of this paragraph with the opening 
 sentences of the 15th and 17th. 
 
 ij. America has a big and growing population. 
 
 9:9. The true number : The best authorities consider Burke's 
 estimate rather below the mark. 
 
 9:13. Population shoots : It is thought the gain in the decade 
 preceding this speech was 500,000. 
 
 16. So large a mass of people must not be trifled with. 
 9 : 25. A blunter discernment than yours : a bungling attempt at 
 
 compliment. 
 
 9 : 27. Occasional system : fit only for the special emergency 
 or occasion which now demands attention. 
 
 17. Their cofnmercial interests are disproportion- 
 ately great. 
 
 10 : 14. A distinguished person ; Richard Glover, a merchant 
 who wrote dull verses and dabbled in politics. Burke strangely 
 wastes words upon him. Bar : an oak rail across the entrance to 
 the main aisle or floor of the House. Outsiders wishing to address 
 the House stood at this bar. 
 
 18. Properly examiiied, these will surely command 
 the respect of Parliament. 
 
 19. I will compare the trade statistics for the years 
 1704 and 1772. 
 
 20. I have included under exports to America, those 
 to Africa and the West Indies. 
 
 11 : 16. Terminati72g almost wholly in the colonies: A slave 
 was purchased, not with money, but with articles bought in Eng- 
 land. So the purchase of a slave for America would mean to the 
 English merchant the same thing as the exportation to America of 
 his value in English merchandise. 
 
 11 : 18. The West Indian : dependent for commerce and for 
 protection upon the colonies on the Continent. 
 
 21. In 1704 the total trade to the colo?iies amounted 
 to about six hundred thousand pounds. 
 
 22. In 1772, to six millions. 
 
NOTES. 93 
 
 2j. In that year England exported to the colonies 
 alone, almost as much as in 1704 to the whole world. 
 
 12 : 9. No less than twelvefold : a skilful repetition and con- 
 densation, for the purpose of making his statistics tell. Compare 
 the opening of the next paragraph. 
 
 24. As England values one-third of her export 
 trade she will legislate wisely for the colonies. 
 
 25. This marvelous expansion has taken place in 
 the lifetime of a single man. 
 
 13 : 24. Acta parentum, etc. ; to study the example of his fore- 
 fathers and to learn what virtue is. (Virgil, fourth Eclogue.) 
 
 Like many others of Burke's quotations, Latin or English, this 
 is not verbatim. Sometimes the variation is evidently accidental, 
 but more often it is due to Burke's facile shaping of the extract to 
 suit his precise purpose. 
 
 13 : 30. The third prince : George III., whose father, Fred- 
 erick, died as Prince of Wales. 
 
 14:1. To be made Great Britain: In 1707 the Treaty of 
 Union joined Scotland to England. 
 
 14 : 2. Turn back the current : After Henry Bathurst was 
 appointed Lord Chancellor in 177 1, his father was made an earl, 
 while he himself became a baron ; distinctions thus passing from 
 son to father, in a degree, rather than from father to son. 
 
 Burke naturally selected Lord Bathurst for the purposes of this 
 paragraph, both because he had lived a life of extraordinary 
 length and public activity, and because such congratulatory re- 
 marks would please certain members of the government. Earl 
 Bathurst was a typical member of that House of Lords which had 
 just returned the penal bill with emphatic approval. 
 
 26. Pennsylvania" s imports in 1772 were fifty tunes 
 as great as in 1704. 
 
 27. The truth about American co7?imerce is stranger 
 than fiction. 
 
 28. A study of colonial importations into England 
 would lead to the same conclusion. 
 
94 OjV CONCILIATION WITH AM&RlCA. 
 
 15 : 17. Deceive : a translation of fa Here, which has in Latin 
 the same double sense. 
 
 29. The extensive agriculture of the colonies is a 
 necessity to England. 
 
 16:2. Roman charity: Cymon, being condemned to starve 
 in prison, was kept alive by his daughter Xanthippe, with milk 
 from her own breast. (Hyginus.) A similar story is told of 
 Euphrasia and Evander. 
 
 jo. Their energy and courage in the fisheries are 
 admirable. 
 
 16 : 20. The antipodes : the Southern seas. 
 
 16 : 21. Serpent : Hydrus, a small constellation in the extreme 
 south; not Hydra, which lies within 35 ° of the equator. 
 
 Falkland Island : The Falkland Islands were ceded to Eng- 
 land by Spain in 1771- Before that time they had been regarded 
 as " too remote an object for the grasp of national ambition." 
 
 16 : 22. Romantic suggests the Atlantis fable. 
 
 16 : 27. Draw the line and strike the harpoon : fish and whale. 
 16:28. Run the longitude: sail in a generally southerly (or 
 
 northerly) direction. There is some doubt as to Burke's familiarity 
 with sailor talk ; this expression is not now common, nor can it be 
 ascertained that it ever was. But the idea is plain enough, that, 
 starting from their New England home port, the whalers would 
 run south along the sixtieth meridian of longitude, to the coast of 
 Brazil. 
 
 The common nautical expression " to run down the longitude " 
 means a different thing, and could not have been in Burke's mind. 
 
 17 : I. Dexterous and firm sagacity : This and other expres- 
 sions in this paragraph seem to indicate that Burke is approaching 
 the subject of the nature of the colonies. Or is their nature only 
 one of the circumstances affecting the general problem ? This 
 question will be settled quite clearly in the end, but it is well to 
 try to anticipate that settlement. See lines 10-12 and 16. 
 
 17 : 10. A wise and salutary neglect : This phrase is entitled 
 to special consideration, as the key to Burke's" solution of the 
 Colonial problem. 
 
-7> NOTES. ae 
 
 17:15. Human contrivances : An incidental reference to the 
 project. 
 
 ji. Such colonies will be better controlled by pru- 
 dence than by force. 
 
 1 7 : 20. A different conclusion, etc. : At this point begins a 
 digression, the object of which is to win over some members who, 
 angry at the colonial spirit of liberty, rely on arms to subdue it. 
 Burke supposes it useless to present arguments in favor of his res- 
 olutions to such men, till he has tried to persuade them of the 
 foolishness of their own doctrine. The four objections to the use 
 of force occupy only one page ; but they are so cogent and so 
 clearly put that if they had not fallen on sterile ground they would 
 have proved good seeds of peace. Probably they actually resulted 
 in shaking the inner convictions of the fighters just enough to 
 render their actions the more obstinate and prompt. The firstlings 
 of their hearts became the firstlings of their hands, — at Bunker 
 Hill. 
 
 1 7 : 30. Considering force not as an odious, etc. : This closing 
 passage may be regarded as summing up the preceding discussion. 
 With all its brevity it safely avoids needless antagonism by harsh 
 words. The phrase profitable and subordinate is especially pol- 
 itic, since it emphasizes the agreement of Burke's ultimate aim 
 with that of the majority. 
 
 32. Force may temporarily subdue ; it cannot govern. 
 
 j j. Force might not subdue ; then England would 
 be without resource. 
 
 18:8. Terror is not always, etc. : American history is full of 
 examples, besides the Revolution. How does it compare in this 
 respect with the history of England ? Of Holland ? 
 
 J4. Force at best could not give us America intact. 
 
 jj. Experience advises against it. 
 
 j6. Moreover the character of the Americans de- 
 mands a different policy. 
 
 19 : 13. Te?nper and character : This looks as if Burke were 
 going to make a special discussion of the nature of the colonists, 
 
9 6 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 apart from their numbers or commercial importance. Can the 
 facts about the nature of the Americans that appear in the preced- 
 ing discussion be regarded as subordinate to the facts about their 
 material activities, — explanatory details used to expound with due 
 emphasis, the circumstances of the colonists ? If here we find the 
 opposite course followed, and material circumstances used to ex- 
 pound the nature of the men, we shall feel sure what Burke intended. 
 Upon consideration, it is evident the two ideas cannot be divorced, 
 but only presented in altered relation to each other. 
 
 jy. There are six reasons why the spirit of liberty 
 is stronger in our colonists than in a?iy other people. 
 
 19 : 19. Shuffle, etc. : another strong figure drawn from the 
 game of cards. Gambling was the chief recreation of high society 
 in Burke's day. 
 
 38. America inherits the English belief that self- 
 taxation is the crucial test of liberty. 
 
 19 : 28. / hope, respects, etc. : Burke deplored the surrender 
 of much popular power to the King. Of course the people's atti- 
 tude toward America was the direct moral result of this surrender. 
 
 19 : 30. Emigrated from you: during the religious and polit- 
 ical excitements which marked the reigns of the Stuart kings. 
 
 20 : 3. Abstract liberty : As usual Burke explains this gen- 
 eral statement in the following sentences. It is open to question 
 whether this kind of argument was best adapted to convince the 
 Parliament to which Burke was speaking. How would it appeal 
 to our House ? To our Senate ? 
 
 20 : 22. Blind usages : having their origin not in intelligible 
 principles, but in ancient and forgotten precedents. 
 
 21 : 7. I do not say, etc. : This disclaims the application of 
 the right of self-taxation to the colonies. Such indifference must 
 at first appear to surrender the American cause. But with char- 
 acteristic grasp upon the conduct of the case, Burke reverts to this 
 point fifteen pages later, and makes his strongest argument out of 
 an apparently fatal disclaimer. 
 
 39. The A??ierican assemblies have cultivated the love 
 of self-government. 
 
NOTES. 97 
 
 40. The Protestant religion has intensified the love 
 of liberty in the North. 
 
 22 : 19. Dissidence of dissent, etc. : as we say the " very quint- 
 essence," etc. The expression defies analysis, because it is higher 
 than analysis. 
 
 41. Slavery has had the same effect in the South. 
 
 23 : 28. Gothic : commonly misused in the Eighteenth century, 
 for Saxon. 
 
 23 : 29. The Poles : In 1772 occurred the partition of Poland 
 and the consequent leveling of her classes. Compare page 5, 
 line 2. 
 
 42. The universal study of law has armed the col- 
 onists for self-defence. 
 
 24 : 15. Blackstone's Commentaries on the laws of England, 
 published 1 769. 
 
 24 : 16. General Gage, after being commander-in-chief of the 
 English army in America for several years, became governor of 
 Massachusetts in 1774. When he tried to enforce the act of Par- 
 liament prohibiting town-meetings as likely to stir up sedition, the 
 Boston selectmen were too clever for him. They simply adjourned 
 the meeting from July to August, from August to October, and re- 
 ferred Governor Gage to the crown lawyers. 
 
 24 : 27. Will disdain that ground : Burke probably thought 
 he had just stated the ground on which his friend, Attorney-Gen- 
 eral Thurlow, was preparing to refute. So, in plain words, Burke 
 said, " You may be foolish enough to try to make a point out of 
 this legal knowledge of the colonists. Here it is, all made before 
 you could get your notes down ; and now I'll show you how little 
 it is worth." 
 
 Part of this paragraph was evidently unpremeditated. It seems 
 to have been sharpened by Burke's effort to steal Thurlow's 
 thunder. The taking of notes in Parliament is an unusual 
 proceeding. Ancient etiquette frowns upon any extensive prac- 
 tice of it. 
 
 25 : 1. Abeunt studia in mores ; studies pass over into character. 
 Ovid, Heroides, xv., 83. 
 
98 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 43. The ocean delays and weakens England's gov- 
 ernment in America. 
 
 25:14. No contrivance: Steam and electricity have almost 
 proved Burke a false prophet. 
 
 25 : 22. So far shalt thou go, etc. : King Canute's application 
 of this remark to the instruction of his court is familiar. The book 
 of Job contains the same thought in grander sequence. (Chapter 38. ) 
 
 44. From these six sources has the spirit of liberty 
 sprung. 
 
 45. This spirit must be properly met by England 
 if her government is to succeed. 
 
 26 : 32. What, in the name of God, etc. : This question para- 
 phrases the one in paragraph 14. A good deal of progress has 
 been made in the statement of facts since that preliminary question 
 was put. 
 
 27 : 6. We are called tipon to fix, etc. ; This takes us back to 
 the very beginning of the speech. But see note on page 30, 
 line 4. 
 
 27: 11. Still more untractable form : Stamp Act, Tea Tax, 
 bills of pains and penalties, war, independence — this indicates the 
 actual climax. 
 
 27 : 19. An emanation from yours : evidence of the " wise and 
 salutary policy " of neglecting the colonies. It was in the fifth year 
 of the reign of George III. that this policy was rudely laid aside, 
 and that trouble began. The financial aim of Grenville was to 
 make America pay a part of the debt of ^82,000,000 incurred by 
 Pitt in the war with France. 
 
 27 : 25. An operose business : Gladstone's remark about the 
 constitution of the United States emphasizes this idea. 
 
 27 : 30. Another way : In Massachusetts and Virginia the 
 government had been carried on for some time in absolute defiance 
 of their respective governors, Gage and Dunmore. 
 
 28 : 13. A manufacture, etc. : an echo of the discussion of paper 
 government, ^[ 7. See note. 
 
 46. The present state of things in Massachusetts 
 shows how England has failed. 
 
NOTES. 99 
 
 28 : 23. Abrogated the ancient government, etc. : by the " Act 
 for the better regulating the government of the Province of the 
 Massachusetts Bay in New England." 
 
 The assembly was still to be elected by the people ; but the 
 council was to be appointed by the king, all law-officers by the 
 governor, and all jurymen by the sheriff. The law also required 
 town-meetings to be called by the governor. We have seen how 
 this measure was evaded ; and as to the working of the rest of the 
 act, see lines 26-32. 
 
 29:8. / am much against, etc. : If we follow out this thought 
 we shall get some light on Burke's attitude toward the French 
 Revolutionists. But in their case Burke traced the fault to the 
 people ; not, as in this, to the ruler. 
 
 47. There is no course open but change, prosecu- 
 tion, or compliance. 
 
 29 : 28. An equal attention : One is entitled to suppose that the 
 empty or listless benches here struck Burke's notice for a moment. 
 
 30 : 4. Another : Dean Tucker's, which though not conceived 
 in a statesmanlike spirit, was wiser than Burke thought it. 
 
 The argument by exclusion which begins here, consists of a con- 
 sideration of the three possible courses of action, in the light of the 
 nature and circumstances of the colonists. It is demonstrated that 
 neither of the first two is feasible, but that the third is a practica- 
 ble and wise course. It is now possible to see how much progress 
 has been made toward fixing a policy. The conditions of the 
 problem are before us. 
 
 48. To change the- spirit of liberty is impracticable. 
 
 49. England has no power to check the growth of 
 population. 
 
 30 : 29. To raise the value, etc. : Such an easy reference to a 
 principle of political economy should remind us that Burke was a 
 
 t pioneer in this field of statesmanship. 
 
 V* 50. To attempt it by dispossessing them of the royal 
 ^grants, would be futile, unnatural atid unconstitutional. 
 
 31 : 10. From thence they behold, etc. : evidence of Burke's 
 knowledge of American geography. It was more accurate than 
 
ioo ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 that of the nobleman who left the - office of colonial secretary 
 after many years of service (?) believing New England to be an 
 island. 
 
 31:18. Become masters, etc. : What a subject for a cartoon ! 
 
 31 : 20. All the slaves .- This is another side of the same truth 
 that Pitt uttered in Parliament when it was announced that the 
 Americans were resisting the Stamp Act. " In my opinion, this 
 kingdom has no right to lay a tax on the colonies. . . . Sir, I 
 rejoice that America has resisted. Three millions of people so 
 dead to all the feelings of liberty as voluntarily to submit to be 
 slaves, would have been fit instruments to make slaves of the 
 rest." 
 
 31:23. Increase and multiply: This passage suggests the 
 problem of the Pharaohs in dealing with the Israelites. On the 
 other hand it forms an interesting commentary on the present popu- 
 lation of France. Whereas the Jewish captives were required to 
 make " bricks without straw," and to perform other kinds of ex- 
 hausting labor, in order that their numbers might be reduced, 
 France is thinking of offering premiums for good old-fashioned 
 families. 
 
 31 : 25. Lair of wild beasts : a reference to the " royal wilder- 
 ness " of paragraph 49. 
 
 31 : 27. Our policy hitherto : Repeating the thought in para- 
 graph 17, " wise and salutary neglect." Eventually this idea will 
 dominate in the speech. 
 
 57. Hedging-in the colo?iists is neither prudent nor 
 practicable. 
 
 52. To impoverish the colonies would make them 
 first unserviceable, then rebellious. 
 
 32:10. Their marine enterprises: Burke takes three para- 
 graphs to treat the circumstance, population, in its bearing on the 
 first mode of procedure. But here in paragraph 52, he treats the 
 remaining circumstances, commerce, agriculture and fisheries, all 
 under one head, marine enterprises. He saw that agriculture was 
 significant only from the commercial point of view. 
 
 To take a profound view of related particulars is one of the 
 
NOTES. 101 
 
 marks of a statesman. Burke showed in paragraph 20, a similar 
 insight regarding the African and West Indian trade. 
 
 32:23. A little preposterous : In this sentence Burke reduces 
 the " method " to an absurdity. He deals with it in like manner 
 from the point of view successively of every one of the six causes 
 of the spirit of liberty. Then he takes up the second " method." 
 
 '33:1. Spoliatis arma supersunt : To the impoverished re- 
 mains the privilege of insurrection. (Juvenal, eighth Satire.) 
 
 5J. The spirit of liberty was born in the English 
 colonists and breathes in their language. 
 
 33 : 5- Fierce : because passionately fond of freedom. 
 
 33 • 9- Detect : reveal. 
 
 54. It lives i?i their religion, education, and form 
 of government. 
 
 33 • I 7- Confide to : now confide in. 
 
 33 : 27. Chargeable : expensive. 
 
 33 : 29. Kept hi obedience : Mr. Hammond Lamont quotes 
 from Burke's Address to the King, " That the establishment of such 
 a [military] power in America will utterly ruin our finances — 
 though its certain effect — is the smallest part of our concern. It 
 will become an apt, powerful, and certain engine for the destruc- 
 tion of our freedom here. Great bodies of armed men, trained to 
 a contempt of popular assemblies representative of an English 
 people, — kept up for the purpose of exacting impositions without 
 their consent, and maintained by that exaction, — instruments in 
 subverting, without any process of law, great ancient establish- 
 ments and respected forms of governments, — set free from, and 
 therefore above, the ordinary English tribunals of the country 
 where they serve, — these men cannot so transform themselves 
 merely by crossing the sea, as to behold with love and reverence, 
 and submit with profound obedience to, the very same things in 
 Great Britain which in America they had been taught to despise, 
 and had been accustomed to awe and humble." 
 
 55. To enfranchise the slaves in order to efislave 
 their masters is a?i absurd proposition. 
 
 36. Such a proposition is an impossible hypocrisy. 
 
102 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 34 : 15. As : though. 
 
 34 : 19. One of whose causes of quarrel, etc. : This is one of 
 Burke's characteristic turns of thought which flood a situation with 
 light No wonder he felt he could afford to spend a moment in 
 the whimsical illustrations which follow. 
 
 57. Then the ocean remains. 
 
 58. If the spirit of liberty cannot be changed, shall 
 it be prosecuted as criminal? 
 
 35 : 9. The late exercise of our authority : All the seriously 
 irritating legislation had taken place within the preceding decade. 
 
 59. To prosecute a nation as if it were a band of 
 criminals, would be neither wise nor decent. 
 
 35:15. Too big : Here again begins the discussion of that 
 circumstance, population. This is the only item fully discussed in 
 this connection. Hereafter Burke takes it for granted that the 
 nature and circumstances of the colonies are clearly in the minds 
 of the members. A more methodical debater would have clung to 
 his formal analysis ; but to drop that and not lose in force of argu- 
 ment proves the master. Burke's genius is shown not so much by 
 the plan of the speech, as by the fact that the speech is powerful in 
 spite of interruptions and alterations of the plan. 
 
 35 : 20. Civil dissensions : There are several such terms in 
 this paragi-aph, used to impress Parliament with the need of rea- 
 son in dealing with America. 
 
 35 : 28. Sir Edward Coke : Burke evidently draws a mental 
 parallel between this infamous magistrate and the party which 
 would indict the American people. The type of justice dispensed 
 by this Elizabethan Attorney-General may be seen in a citation 
 from the trial of Sir Walter Raleigh — 
 
 " At the repeating of some things Sir Walter Raleigh inter- 
 rupted him (Coke), and said he did him wrong. 
 
 " Coke. Thou art the most vile and execrable traitor that ever 
 lived. 
 
 " Raleigh. You speak indiscreetly, bai'barously, and uncivilly. 
 
 " Coke. I want words sufficient to express thy viperous treasons,' 
 
 35 : 3°- Ri P e •• ^ady. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 103 
 
 36:1. Upon the very same title: Burke may have thought 
 here of his own birthplace. At any rate he sums up in this phrase, 
 all the claims of the colonists to English citizenship, and therefore 
 to Parliamentary consideration. 
 
 60. A province cannot claim a privilege without 
 confessing itself under imperial authority. 
 
 36 : 6. Distinguished from a single state ; Compare lines 16- 
 26 of the preceding paragraph. 
 
 36 : 10. Constitutions : here used concretely. 
 
 36 : 12. Many local privileges ; Compare the last half of para- 
 graph 43. 
 
 36 : 19. Ex vi termini ; from the very meaning of the term. 
 
 36 : 31. Will it not teach them, etc. : Another powerful turn 
 of thought. Does its brilliancy arise from the speaker's intense 
 sympathy with the colonists ? 
 
 61. If England prosecutes A?nerica, she must act 
 as her own judge, and in a very questionable way. 
 
 37 : 5- We are indeed, etc. : Here Burke returns to the question 
 of criminal procedure. The preceding paragraph may be re- 
 garded as a digression into the philosophy of imperial govern- 
 ment. Can you find the results of the digression used in para- 
 graph 62 ? 
 
 37 : 17. Right: The play on this word in line 19 is justified 
 by the context. 
 
 37 : 21. The most vexatious of all injustice : Compare Cicero, 
 — summum jus, summum injuria, — the extreme of the law is the 
 extreme of injustice. 
 
 37 : 23. Civil litigant in point of right is balanced with whose 
 moral quality, etc. ; culprit before me, with while I sit as a crimi- 
 nal judge, etc. 
 
 62. The experiment in Massachusetts in this mode 
 of criminal procedure has not succeeded. 
 
 38 : 3. Have seemed to adopt that mode : The bearing of the 
 Massachusetts case upon the wisdom of the grand penal bill is di- 
 rect and forcible. It shows up both the principles and the legisla- 
 tors involved, V^hen Burke speaks of criminal proceedings 
 
104 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 against America, it is such bills and such men that he has in 
 mind. 
 
 38 : 5. Formerly addressed : In 1777 Burke wrote to the 
 sheriffs of Bristol as follows : " It is necessary, gentlemen, to ap- 
 prise you that there is an act, made so long ago as in the reign of 
 Henry VIII., before the existence or thought of any English col- 
 onies in America, for the trial in this kingdom of treasons com- 
 mitted out of the realm. In the year 1769 Parliament thought 
 proper to acquaint the Crown with their construction of that act in 
 a formal address, wherein they entreated his Majesty to cause per- 
 sons charged with high treason in America to be brought into this 
 kingdom for trial. By this act of Henry VI II., so construed and 
 so applied, almost all that is substantial and beneficial in a trial by 
 jury is taken away from the subject in the colonies. This is, how- 
 ever, saying too little ; for to try a man under that act is, in effect, 
 to condemn him unheard. A person is brought hither in the dun- 
 geon of a ship's hold ; thence he is vomited into a dungeon on 
 land, loaded with irons, unfurnished with money, unsupported by 
 friends, three thousand miles from all means of calling upon or 
 confronting evidence, where no one local circumstance that tends 
 to detect perjury can possibly be judged of; — such a person may 
 be executed according to form, but he can never be tried according 
 to justice." 
 
 6j. Our experience thus far reflects no credit on 
 such a plan. 
 
 38 : 18. Menaces is largely explained by penal laws in line 20, 
 and force in line 23. Both houses of Parliament had also ad- 
 dressed the king with heated and numerous assurances of their 
 readiness to support the royal authority in the colonies. 
 
 38: 20. Penal laws: such as the Stamp Act, the Tea Duty 
 Bill, the Boston Port Bill, the Act for the Impartial Administration 
 of Justice in Massachusetts, and various other attempts to coerce 
 the Americans, down to the pending penal bill. 
 
 38 : 23. By land and sea : about 3,000 seamen in nineteen 
 vessels ; together with the shore garrisons which the King had re- 
 cently asked the House of Commons to increase. 
 
 38 : 28. Correctly : exactly; a tautology, 
 
NOTES. 105 
 
 64. Only the third metJiod seems advisable, — to 
 comply with the American spirit. 
 
 -^ 65. We must concede the boon America desires, — 
 some form of self-taxation. 
 
 39 • 9- The characteristic mark and seal of British freedom was 
 the privilege of self-taxation. 
 
 66. The question is not one of rights but of policy. 
 
 39 : 20. Nothing to do with the question : The opening eight 
 lines of this paragraph constitute a piece of irony that must have 
 attracted the attention even of the king's henchmen who slept in 
 their seats, or ate oranges. 
 
 39:30. Polity: government. 
 
 40 : 9. Serbonian bog : Herodotus found this bog in Northern 
 Egypt, but it has long since disappeared. With it Milton com- 
 pares certain regions of Hell, over which the bands of fallen an- 
 gels wandered while Satan was on his journey to Earth. 
 
 Burke in a previous debate had not hesitated to admit that Par- 
 liament had an unquestionable right to tax America. But in such 
 matters his appeal was to expediency, as, in government, the higher 
 law. 
 
 40:13. The question with me is, etc.: a powerful antithesis, 
 compelling attention to the practical side of the problem of Amer- 
 ican taxation. There is compressed into this sentence most of 
 Burke's general policy toward the colonies. 
 
 The last two questions in the paragraph emphasize the idea of 
 line 15. Compare paragraph 34. 
 
 67. No consideratioji should deter us from suiting 
 colonial government to colonial love of freedom. 
 
 41:3. Solemnly abjured : One of Johnson's strong points in 
 his Taxation no Tyranny was that by voluntarily quitting England 
 the colonists had resigned their right to self-government. 
 
 68. Therefore we ought to assure the colonies a 
 permanent interest in the British constitution. 
 
 41 : 16. An interest in the constitution means a share in such 
 privileges as the constitution secures for citizens. Ireland has to- 
 day a small interest, Canada a large one. Burke proposes to make 
 
106 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 the Americans feel they have lost nothing of their birthright of 
 citizenship by emigrating. 
 
 69. The time is past i?i which a negative course 
 cote Id secure contentment. 
 
 41 : 23. Understood principle : The Stamp Tax was repealed 
 as a revenue act, not as a trade law, — a distinction on which the 
 next four or five paragraphs dwell. Trade laws had been enforced 
 upon the colonies for over a century, with comparatively slight ob- 
 jection on their part. 
 
 41 : 26. To give perfect content : It is an interesting question 
 for discussion, whether it was still possible for England perma- 
 nently to bind the thirteen colonies to herself. 
 
 70. The concessio?i of self-taxation is opposed on 
 the ground that America would then attack the trade 
 laws. 
 
 42 : 1. American financiers ; Members who hope for any con- 
 siderable revenue from the colonies. 
 
 42 : 3. Exquisite : apprehensive. Compare inquisitive. 
 
 42 : 8. Further views : Burke discusses this argument in para- 
 graph 75. It was a favorite one with the opponents of concession. 
 
 42:13. A gentleman: Mr. Rice, one of those holding the 
 opinion that the colonies would take an ell if given an inch. It 
 was quite generally suspected that America was aiming at inde- 
 pendence. 
 
 71. When we argue that taxation is unjust because 
 of the trade-law burden, Lord North claims the trade 
 laws are of no account. 
 
 42 : 23. Shall: is bound to ; the old sense of the word. 
 
 72. But when we argue against taxation on prin- 
 ciple, Lord North pleads for it as a safeguard to the 
 trade laws. 
 
 7 j. We admit the trade laws are of use, but think 
 the?n a burde?i on America, and ?iot threate?ied by tax-con- 
 cession. 
 
 43 : 19. Confine is intensified by narrow. 
 
NOTES. 107 
 
 74. The presumption is that all trouble would be 
 avoided by conceding the taxing privilege. 
 
 44 : 2. Not a shadow of evidence : This is an exaggeration. 
 The trade laws had been felt as an oppression for more than a cen- 
 tury. Possibly Burke refers to the two great disputes in the pre- 
 ceding decade. The complaints of earlier trade regulations had 
 been local, and perhaps had hardly risen to the dignity of Burke's 
 idea of a dispute. 
 
 44 : 11. Decency : Courtesy to an opponent due to one's self. 
 
 75. Is it not the natural course to remove the 
 avowed cause of quarrel ? 
 
 44:21. Panic fears : imaginary fears such as Pan was sup- 
 posed to inspire by the loneliness and shadows of the woods, the 
 howling of the wind, etc. 
 
 jtf. I favor that course since all objections to it are 
 purely conjectural. 
 
 44:31. Suspicions, conjectures, divinations : Each term con- 
 demns some special objection. Suspicions show lack of faith in 
 American loyalty ; conjectures are mere guesses at what so ener- 
 getic a^people may do ; divinations indicate superstition. 
 
 7/f. In the light of English history I have formu- 
 lated a plan. 
 
 45 : 9- Wisdom of our ancestors : Conservatism is the keynote 
 of Burke's statesmanship. 
 
 J xtm As Spanish statesmen conszdted the genius of 
 Phitip the Second, I have consulted the spirit of the Eng- 
 lish constitution. 
 
 45 : 20. Issue of their affairs : Judging from the relative co- 
 lonial strength of Spain and England to-day, the genius of Philip 
 would seem completely to have misled his clients. 
 
 45 : 23. The English constitution is not, like that of the United 
 States, a written body of fundamental principles of government. 
 It consists of various great pieces of legislation, of judicial and 
 parliamentary precedents, and of many unwritten laws. This does 
 not mean that the English constitution is vague or fragile, but 
 
io8 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 simply that the principles underlying all these concrete expressions 
 of the national spirit have not been abstracted, and formulated, as 
 ours have, in a single document. 
 
 Burke frequently uses the word constitution not as here, but as 
 in paragraph 77, to indicate the national spirit itself, — its powers, 
 its claims, its responsiveness, its freedom, its unity. 
 
 45 : 25. Four capital examples : There was no superstition in 
 consulting this oracle, — the history of four important cases similar 
 to that of America. 
 
 J 9. Ireland after Jive hundred years of force, was 
 really won by the extension of the privileges of the con- 
 stitution. 
 
 45 : 28. Ireland before the English conquest was a seething 
 mass of petty kingdoms. Henry II. in 1172 conquered a strip of 
 land on the East, and peopled it with English subjects. This sec- 
 tion was called the Pale ; and this alone partook of the feast of 
 Magna Charta and enjoyed the other English privileges as they were 
 granted. After several so-called conquests, the whole country was 
 subdued by force in the reign of Elizabeth, and granted civil 
 rights in that of her successor. 
 
 46: 18. Sir John Davies : Speaker of the first Irish House 
 of Commons, in the reign of James I. The work to which Burke 
 refers has an interesting title, — " Discovery of the true causes why 
 Ireland was never entirely subdued nor brought under Obedience 
 of the Crown of England until the Beginning of his Majesty's 
 happy Reign." 
 
 46:24. Civility: civilization. 
 
 46 : 29. Changed the people : especially in the North by the col- 
 onization of Ulster in 1610. (See Green's Short History, pp. 
 439-453, for an account of the affairs of Ireland up to the reign 
 of Charles I.) Altered the religion : The Church of England sup- 
 planted the Church of Rome. 
 
 47 : 3. Usurpation : the Commonwealth, 1649-1660. 
 
 47 : 4. The glorious revolution : of 1688, which brought in 
 William of Orange and the Bill of Rights. 
 
 47 : 7. Principal part : another evidence of Burke's love for 
 Ireland. 
 
NOTES. 109 
 
 47:11. Were done seems to be open to grammatical crit- 
 icism. 
 
 47 : 13. An exception to prove the rule : a complacent use of 
 an old Latin adage. The saying has no point, however, unless the 
 case in hand is admitted to be exceptional. 
 
 47 : 17. Lucrative : not lucrative. 
 
 47 : 18. The stated and fixed rule has been that Ireland should 
 tax herself. When a breach has been made in this constitution 
 (i. e., institution or rule) she has raised no taxes. 
 
 80. Wales, under the Lords Marchers, was in per- 
 petual anarchy. 
 
 47:32. Lords Marchers: lords of the marches or frontiers. 
 They were sanctioned by the early English kings to rule such ter- 
 ritory in Wales as they could seize and hold. After Edward I. 
 conquered the country, a movement toward introducing English 
 laws and customs began, which, notwithstanding fifteen penal reg- 
 ulations, did not succeed till Henry VIII. gave the Welsh an inter- 
 est in the English constitution. 
 
 48 : 5. Secondary ; incidental to his military authority. Burke 
 slyly defines this government in such terms as strongly to suggest 
 recent attempts to control Virginia (Dunmore) and Massachusetts 
 (Gage) by military power. 
 
 81. Fifteen penal laws were enacted by Parliament. 
 48:21. Disarm New England; General Gage was ordered 
 
 to seize the military stores at Cambridge and other places, and 
 bring them to Boston. 
 
 82. Yet Wales continued an unprofitable and oppress- 
 ive burden to England. 
 
 49 : 4. Rid : old form of rode. 
 
 Incubus : a nightmare; an oppressive burden. 
 
 8 j. In the reign of Henry VIII. gradual concessions 
 of liberty resulted in obedience a?id contentment. 
 
 49 : 13. Ill-husbandry : false economy. 
 
 49 : 14. Tyranny of a free people : tyranny exercised by a free 
 people. 
 
 50 : 5. Simul alba nautis, etc.: Their clear star has shone 
 
no ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 forth upon the sailors, and lo, the stormy seas flow back down the 
 rocks, the winds are stilled, the clouds flee away, and, at their 
 bidding, the threatening waves subside upon the deep. — Horace's 
 ode in praise of Castor and Pollux. 
 
 84. At the same time, Chester which had been like 
 Wales in oppression and disorder, petitioned Parlia- 
 ment for representation. 
 
 50 : 11. County Palatine : a county which the owner rules as 
 a king his palace. 
 
 50 : 17. Standing army : of 2,000 archers, hired by the tyrant as 
 his bodyguard. 
 
 50 : 21. Shewen : old form of show; its subject, inhabitants. 
 
 50 : 23. Where : whereas. 
 
 50 : 26. Knights and burgesses : representatives of counties and 
 towns respectively. 
 
 50 : 27. Disherisons : deprivations of property. 
 
 50 : 30. Coi?imonwealth : welfare. 
 51:4. Ne : nor. 
 
 51:7. Derogatory: injurious. Compare with derogation in 
 line 13. 
 
 8j. Parliament cordially granted the petition. 
 
 51 : 12. Libel : undeserved or improper censure. 
 51 : 14. Over : We say upon. 
 
 51 : 17. Temperament : tempering, moderating. 
 
 86. And anarchy in Chester was cured by freedom, 
 as it was in the County of Durham in the reign of 
 Charles II. 
 
 52 : 1. Abstract extent : Refer to paragraph 82. Burke's pur- 
 pose is to silence those who fear the destructive effect of conceding 
 the vital privilege of taxation. 
 
 52 : 3. Any considerable district ; an echo of the argument in 
 paragraph 59. 
 
 87. Now America, compared with Ireland, Wales, 
 Chester and Durham, still ??iore deserves an interest in 
 the co?istitution. 
 
NOTES. Ill 
 
 52:15. Judge Barrington : presiding over three counties of 
 Wales. 
 
 52 : 24. Virtually represented : by having laws made for them 
 by the representatives of one-ninth of the English people; only 
 one million out of nine having the right to elect members to Parlia- 
 ment. 
 
 88. If we cannot give A7?ierica representation in 
 Parliament, what satisfactory substitute can we give ? 
 
 53 • 7- Opposuit natura : nature opposes it. (Juvenal, tenth 
 Satire.) 
 
 89. All we need do, is to go back to the policy we 
 uniformly followed tip to 176$. 
 
 53:25. Republic, Utopia, Oceana: ideal commonwealths; the 
 first produced in the fourth century, B. C, the others in the fif- 
 teenth and seventeenth centuries, A. D., respectively. 
 
 53 : 28. Rude swain : Milton, Comus, 634, has dull swain. 
 Such slight inaccuracies would not occur if the text were consulted 
 with deliberate intent to quote, or if Burke did not in his own 
 mind lay the chief stress on the thought-content of the quotation. 
 For writers less familiar with the original a verification of the 
 words is the part of discretion. 
 
 53 : 29. Clouted shoon : heavy bungling shoes, either because 
 roughly patched, or studded with nails. 
 
 54 : 5. The year ijbj saw Grenville throw over the policy of 
 salutary neglect, and adopt exaction and compulsion in colonial 
 government. 
 
 go. I shall move that the colonial assemblies be al- 
 lowed to grant their own taxes, as they have done legally, 
 dutifully and beneficially in the past. 
 
 54 : 6. My resolutions : The substance of the resolutions is 
 suggested by the italics in this paragraph. They will repay care- 
 ful consideration in pairs,— grant and i?nposition ; dutiful and 
 beneficial; benefit and futility. 
 
 54 : 10. Aids : another synonym for supplies, subsidies, 
 revenue. 
 
ii2 ON CONCIL TA TION WITH AMERICA . 
 
 91. I shall move six resolutions which, if accepted, 
 will become the pillars of a temple of British concord. 
 
 54 : 21. The temple of British concord : On page 47, line 22, 
 this thought first appears. It becomes amplified into a very signifi- 
 cant idea as the speech goes on. 
 
 92. The first resolution simply records the fact that 
 two million free Americans, in fourteen governments, 
 have 7io representation in Parliame?it. 
 
 93. The second states that these people are discon- 
 tented with the impositions laid upon the?n by Parliame?it. 
 
 55 : 20. Subsidies given, granted and assented to : This really 
 means taxes, demanded of the colonies. 
 
 94. If the language of this resolution seems unfit, re- 
 member I have simply transcribed it from an ancient act 
 of Parliament. 
 
 55 : 29. Non metis hie sermo, etc. : The doctrine is not mine, 
 but that of Ofellus ; who, though a rustic, is wise after a fashion of 
 his own. (Horace, second Satire.) 
 
 55 : 3 1 * Produce : product is more precise. 
 
 56 : 3. Metal, stones, tracks : Here is profusion, if not con- 
 fusion, of metaphors. 
 
 The thought of venerable rust may have come from Juvenal 
 (thirteenth Satire} ; the thought of profaning the altar with tools 
 was evidently suggested by Exodus, 22. Professor Cook says : 
 " Observe how the idea of the temple is maintained ; even the 
 suggestion from Juvenal contributes, — Compare too, those who de- 
 spoil some ancient temple of its massive chalices with their vener- 
 able rust, etc." 
 
 95. America has been touched a?id grieved, as is 
 shown in the admissions and the acts of the advocates of 
 taxation themselves. 
 
 56 : 29. Grieved in their privileges : Burke uses a strong 
 illustration of this fact in his speech on American Taxation. " The 
 feelings of the colonies were formerly the feelings of Great Britain. 
 Theirs were formerly the feelings of Mr. Hampden, when called 
 
NOTES. 113 
 
 upon for the payment of twenty shillings. Would twenty shillings 
 have ruined Mr. Hampden's fortune ? No ! but the payment of 
 half twenty shillings on the principle it was demanded would have 
 made him a slave." 
 
 57 ; 15. Lord Hillsborough being colonial secretary, wrote to 
 America a public assurance that the ministry intended not only to 
 lay no further taxes on the colonies, but to remove the duties then 
 levied on glass, paper and colors, as duties laid contrary to the true 
 principle of commerce. 
 
 57 : 20. The resolution : the " project." 
 
 96. The third resolution states that no practical 
 method of representation has yet been devised. 
 
 97. The fourth, that every colony has a general as- 
 sembly legally authorized to levy taxes for public use. 
 
 98. Some officers of the Crown deny the legality of 
 these grants to the Crown, but they accept them, notwith- 
 standing. 
 
 58 : 16. Paradoxically : The contradiction was between their 
 theories and their practice. In theory, prominently held by Gren- 
 ville, Parliament alone could grant supplies to the crown. Yet 
 practically the thing was done by certain colonies every year. 
 
 58:21. Some of the law servants: In 1 766 Lord Mansfield 
 declared it unconstitutional for any number of people without the 
 consent of Parliament, to raise money for the King. 
 
 58:21. If the crown could be responsible: "Whatever the 
 English Sovereign does officially is done by the advice of his 
 ministers, who are held responsible." (Lamont's note.) 
 
 99. The fifth resolution asserts that these assemblies 
 have not only granted money to the Ki?ig, but that Par- 
 lia7tient has gratefully acknowledged these grants. 
 
 59:10. So high :« so far back." (Lamont.) 
 
 100. For example, Parliament in 1748 reimbursed 
 for such grants, four New England colonies. 
 
 jot. The amount in this instance was over 
 £200,000, 
 
ii4 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 59 : 26. Public credit : An incidental evidence of the legality 
 of the grant. 
 
 102. In 1756 the King requested Parliament to 
 thank the colonies in his behalf. 
 
 103. On this and other occasions, up to 1763, Parlia- 
 ment voted reimburse7?ients as an encouragement to the 
 colonies to continue. 
 
 104. The journals prove that up to 1763 the as- 
 semblies gave only too freely, and that their right to give 
 was never questioned. 
 
 60 : 19. Two things ; Compare the fifth resolution. 
 
 61:2. Miserable stories: Lamont quotes from Franklin's 
 testimony before Parliament : " America has been greatly mis- 
 represented and abused here in papers and pamphlets and speeches, 
 as ungrateful and unreasonable and unjust, in having put this na- 
 tion to immense expense for their defence and refusing to bear any 
 part of that expense." 
 
 Two and a half millions had been their contribution towards de- 
 fraying the expenses of the French and Indian War. 
 
 61 : 3. Misguided people : the people of England. 
 
 61 : 15. Subject to the payment of taxes : not taxes formally 
 laid, but debts assumed in response to requisitions from the min- 
 isters of the crown. 
 
 61 : 26. Requisition : The word is more formal and authorita- 
 tive than request, but less arbitrary than imposition. See require 
 in the fifth resolution. 
 
 103. Since 1763 the policy of imposition has been 
 tried, but has produced no revenue but disco?itent. 
 
 61 : 30. Revenue by grant : revenue voted in the colonial as- 
 semblies. 
 
 106. The sixth resolution asserts the superiority of 
 voluntary grants by the assemblies, over impositions laid 
 by Parliament. 
 
 62: 12. Granting etc.: This is the interest in the British 
 Constitution Burke wished to give America, 
 
NOTES. 115 
 
 107. There was no need of taking the power from 
 the colonial assemblies. 
 
 108. Will you choose, then, to abide by a profitable 
 experience, or a mischievous theory ? 
 
 100. The first corollary resolution is directed 
 against five penal regulations. 
 
 63 : 6. The following resolution has several points in common 
 with what the colonists called the Intolerable Acts. 
 
 63:10. Granting : levying. 
 
 63: 12. Drawback; A rebate allowed on the import duty 
 when imported goods were exported. 
 
 63:16. Clandestine running ; smuggling. 
 
 63 : 19. An ad to discontinue: The Boston Port Bill. 
 
 63:25. An act for the impartial administration of justice : 
 The Transportation Act. This provided for the transportation to 
 England or to another colony, of any person accused of a capital 
 offence committed while aiding the magistrates to enforce the law. 
 It was this act which, as Burke said, put the King's soldiers beyond, 
 and therefore above, the courts of an English colony. 
 
 63 ; 31. ' An act for the better regulating, etc. : This abrogated 
 the charter-government of Massachusetts. It is explained in 
 paragraph 46, and the note on it. 
 
 63 •. 34. An act for the trial of treasons : See note on line 4, 
 page 38. 
 
 1 10. Here are my reasons for wishing to repeal the 
 
 Boston Port Bill. 
 
 64 : 8. Restraining Bill: the " grand penal bill." 
 
 64 : 12. Equal guilt : Circumstances conspired to give Eng- 
 lishmen the impression that Massachusetts (especially Boston) was 
 the most aggressive of the American malcontents. 
 
 in. Similarly I disbelieve in abrogating the charter 
 
 of Massachusetts. 
 
 64 : 20. Less power : for example, in the matter of veto. 
 
 64:27. Exceptionable: blameworthy. 
 
 64 : 32. The returning officer : the sheriff in his capacity as 
 suramoner of juries. 
 
n6 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 112. The act for the trial of favorites of the govern- 
 ment is justly obnoxious. 
 
 65 : 5. Temporary : to remain in force three years. There is 
 a gibe at this idea, in the following sentences. 
 
 1 1 j. The act for the trial of treasons has no just 
 bearing on the American colonies. 
 
 65 : 15. In places, etc.: Burke feels that the American col- 
 onies, with English charters, having the law intelligently admin- 
 istered (see paragraph 42), do not come under this head. 
 
 114. The second corollary resolution proposes to 
 purge the colonial judiciary . 
 
 65 : 17. Having gttarded : by several of the items of the first 
 corrollary resolution. Some of those items have a double bearing 
 however. 
 
 65 : 23. Settled salary : settled not by the king, but by vote of 
 the local legislature; and paid not out of rents accruing to the 
 king (which would compromise a judge's independence), but by 
 colonial grant. • 
 
 65 : 27. During good behavior : and not during the pleasure of 
 the king. 
 
 65 : 29. On complaint : The complaint might originate with 
 the general assembly, that is, council and house of representatives 
 in conjunction ; or it might originate with any separate branch of 
 the colonial government. 
 
 115. The third, to do a similar service for the ad- 
 miralty courts. 
 
 66:1. Courts of admiralty : in which marine questions and 
 customs cases were settled. By an atrocious plan which had just 
 been changed when this speech was delivered, the admiralty-jus- 
 tice was paid with a portion of the goods condemned in his own 
 court, a third of all seizures also going to the governor of the 
 province. Naturally seizures were thought desirable by these of- 
 ficials. In the course of discussion Burke was informed of the 
 redress of this grievance, and the resolution was amended. 
 
 66 ; 6. Commodious ; convenient. They were few and far apart. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 117 
 
 116. The courts should be situated conveniently and 
 administered with honor. 
 
 ii7- These three corollary resolutions embrace what 
 is practicable as an application of the first six. 
 
 66 : 20. Consequential ; consequent. 
 
 118. Of objections to my plan, the first will be that 
 the Chester preamble protests against all parliamentary 
 control as well as against taxation. 
 
 66:31. The first will be, etc.: The straw man that Burke 
 now sets up is an interesting dummy. Burke shows what he is 
 made of in paragraph 119. 
 
 110. The resolution is drawn from the Durham pre- 
 amble , which had reference to taxation only. 
 
 67 : 11. Inconclusive : unfounded, that is, not drawn from the 
 language of the preamble with logical accuracy, as a sound con- 
 clusion should be. This is an unusual sense of the word, which 
 usually means unconvincing. 
 
 67 : 16. Moved to have read : in order to prove that the taxa- 
 tion of dependencies without their voice, had always been the 
 right of Parliament. 
 
 67 : 18. In favor of his opinions : Pitt replied that he would 
 cite the same preambles to show that former Parliaments had been 
 ashamed of this arbitrary taxation and had abandoned it. 
 
 67:21. As favorable as possible to both: but distinctly more 
 favorable to Pitt, and now to Burke, than to Grenville. 
 
 67 : 30. De jure or de facto bound : bound by right, or by fact 
 without regard to right. The question of the right to tax these 
 dependencies was "put totally out of the question." 
 
 120. The colonies would of course like ideal liberty, 
 but they will be quite content with the concession I pro- 
 pose. 
 
 68:12. Illation: the name for the mental process which re- 
 sults in an inference. Study the derivation. 
 
 We Englishmen stop : The remainder of the paragraph is de- 
 voted to proving and illustrating the first ten lines. 
 
n8 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 Compromise and barter : a favorite principle with Burke, and 
 one which he did much to teach the world. 
 
 68 : 30. Apt to make slaves haughty : as a tyrannical government 
 is apt to beget many corrupt aristocratic dependants. This arti- 
 ficial importance which had undermined the English nation in the 
 
 reigns of Charles I. and Charles II., was exactly what Burke, as a 
 Whig, most strongly opposed. 
 
 69 : 12. The cords of man : the touch of nature that makes the 
 whole world kin. The expression as used in Hosea XI., means 
 heart-strings, but Burke applies it to common prudence. 
 
 121. Their natural impulse will be loyalty, when 
 they find England a gracious and indulgent protector. 
 
 69 : 24. Security, not the rival : an appeal to the magnanimity 
 of his hearers which it seems impossible should have failed to 
 touch them. 
 
 69 : 30. Some share of those rights : Some interest in the Brit- 
 ish Constitution. 
 
 122. True imperial unity, like the unity of the hu- 
 man body, was exemplified in our relatiotis with Amer- 
 ica up to 1763. 
 
 70:11. Separate legislature: Pitt, the younger, in 1800. 
 bought out the Irish Parliament and united it with that of England. 
 
 70 : 14. Conservation : a stronger term than preservation. 
 
 123. I will briefly state my objections to Lord 
 North' s project for American revenue. 
 
 70 : 27. Proposition of the noble lord : "the project." 
 
 71 : 4. Before the committee : of the whole House, Feb. 20. 
 
 124. I object to it because it is an unprecedented ex- 
 periment upon the peace of this Empire. 
 
 71 : 10. Experimentum, etc. : experiment on a worthless ob- 
 ject. The rule is, — Fiat experimentum, etc. 
 
 71 : 12. Adverse to : Compare aversion from, line 22, page 21. 
 Adverse is generally used of things, not of persons. 
 
 125. Secondly, because the taxing would be done, not 
 by Parliame7tt but by some cabinet committee. 
 
NOTES. 119 
 
 71:23. Proportional payment : taking into consideration the 
 actual wealth of every colony ; its wealth compared with that of 
 every other colony ; its wealth compared with that of Great 
 Britain ; also, the absolute and relative burdens of these various 
 governments. 
 
 71:28. Back door: Compare line 17. The ministry would 
 have to proportion the payments, and Parliament would not dare 
 re-open so complex a question. 
 
 126. Thirdly, because it pretends to give satisfaction, 
 but is a mere delusio7i. 
 
 127. Fourthly, because in the way of administration 
 would lie insurmountable obstacles ; as, first, the diffi- 
 culty of settling proportion of payments. 
 
 128. Second, the difficulty of coercing those colonies 
 which refuse to bid, while those which bid bear all the 
 burden. 
 
 73 : 8. Composition : compromise. 
 
 73:21. English revemie : English merchants paid duty on 
 the importation of immense quantities of tobacco. 
 
 74 : 3. Confound the innocent with the guilty : as the penal bill 
 would punish all New England colonies for the sins of part ; and 
 as it would include with those who were responsible for the dis- 
 turbances, many who had been absent at sea. This Restraining 
 Bill was passed over the protest of 4,500 Quakers on Nantucket, 
 who were " entirely innocent in respect to the present disturbances 
 in America, and who would be exposed to all the hardships of 
 famine." (Quoted by Lamont from the Parliamentary History.') 
 
 129. Third, the dilemma of a trifling fixed revenue 
 on one hand, and constant quarrel about the amount on 
 the other. 
 
 ijo. Fourth, intestine dissatisfaction which will 
 require constant suppression. 
 
 74 1 19. Treasury extent : " a writ issued against the body, 
 land and goods of a crown debtor." (Cook.) 
 
120 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 74 : 27. The Empire of Germany : the tottering Holy Roman 
 Empire, which Napoleon dissolved in 1806. 
 
 74 : 28. Quotas and contingents : substantially interchange- 
 able terms. Every one of the States, with Austria at their head, 
 was called upon for so much money and so many troops. 
 
 iji. Instead of a standing quarrel, so provoked, I 
 propose a plan of peace and union. 
 
 132. My plan, unlike Lord North's, is simple, mild, 
 recommended by experience, universal and immediate in 
 operation, and an act of free grace. 
 
 75: 16. Perplexed and intricate mazes : Compare paragraphs 
 9 and 10. 
 
 i j j. To those who argue that it gives no revenue, I 
 reply that freedom, prosperity and gratitude in the sub- 
 ject are the greatest of all revenues. 
 
 76 : 18. Posita luditur area : the treasure-chest itself is staked 
 on the game — Juvenal, first Satire. 
 
 79 : 21. Accumulated a debt : proving the possession of a cor- 
 responding credit. 
 
 77 : 2. Has a tendency to increase the stock ; It is nowadays a 
 commonplace, that any disturbance of the public mind affects trade. 
 
 77 : 6. Voluntary flow of heaped up plenty : Observe the 
 cheerfulness with which the burden of our American public ex- 
 penditures is born at the present time. 
 
 134. Moreover in a free country there are parties ; 
 and parties for their own good woiild vie with one an- 
 other in serving the mother country. 
 
 77 : 19. This game : There is hardly a more suggestive figure 
 of speech in the oration than this. Contrast, in imagination, the 
 state of America as Burke desired it, — the game of parties being 
 played in a free atmosphere with a voluntary appeal to England as 
 holder of the stakes — with the state of America Lord North's plan 
 would produce, in which " absolute power would be ill obeyed 
 because odious, and contracts would be ill kept because con- 
 strained." 
 
NOTES. 121 
 
 2 35' What we want is the payment of that eternal 
 debt which is due to generous government from protected 
 freedom. 
 
 136. Expect no material revenue from America ex- 
 cept imposts, trade advantages, and the defrayal of 
 colonial expenses. 
 
 78 : 16. Taxable objects : especially tobacco. 
 
 78 : 18. Foreign sale ; Burke's idea is that the duty paid by 
 .English merchants on imports from America, is clear gain to the 
 
 nation, because it is paid out of the profits of these imports when 
 they are resold to other countries. The word you is applied first 
 to the treasury of England, then to the people of England. 
 
 78:25. Enemies: Spain and, especially, France. Both 
 countries seriously menaced the American colonies in case of 
 European War. 
 
 137. Bind her to you by those ties which alone are 
 vital, English kinship and English privilege. 
 
 78:29. Her interest: Burke uses the closing paragraphs of 
 the speech, to enforce this central principle of his politics. 
 
 79 : 29. Of price : precious, a Latinism. It suggests the 
 Scriptural — "of great price." 
 
 79 : 23. True Act of Navigation : Emphasis is again laid on 
 the spirit of the constitution. Compare page 76, line 10, " the 
 first of all revenues." 
 
 79 : 29. Registers, bonds, affidavits : as connected with custom- 
 house operations. 
 
 79 : 30. Sufferances: permits for the shipment of dutiable goods. 
 Cockets : receipts for payment of duties. 
 
 Clearances : Sailing papers granted to merchantmen. 
 
 80 : 2. The great contexture of the mysterious whole : Read 
 Morley's Life of Burke, pages 162 and 163. 
 
 138. These are the motives which make England her- 
 self what she is. 
 
 80:15. Mutiny Bill: a strange name for the act annually 
 passed to provide for certain expenses of the British army. Green 
 
122 ON CONCILIATION WITH AMERICA. 
 
 gives a luminous account of its original passage, as a corollary of 
 the Bill of Rights in 1689. (Short History, page 666.) 
 
 80 : 22. Nothing but rotten timber : an expression interesting 
 when contrasted with our modern phrase, " the men behind the 
 guns." 
 
 139. Those who recognize the national spirit will 
 feel that it dictates that ancient, generous wisdom, which 
 has made the true greatness of the British Empire. 
 
 80:25. Mechanical politicians ; relying on "passive tools,' 
 etc., paragraph 137. 
 
 81 : 2. Little minds: From the vote on Burke's resolutions 
 they seem to have had a majority of about four to one, in that 
 Parliament. 
 
 81:5. Auspicate : favorably introduce. The word is derived 
 from auspicium, the consultation of the birds by the Roman' 
 augurs. It is not quite in harmony with the phrase from the 
 Christian liturgy which follows. 
 
 81 : 15. As we have got, etc. : For the method, see Burke's 
 doctrine of " salutary neglect." This sentence and the ones 
 which immediately precede and follow it, are perhaps the strongest 
 in the speech. 
 
 140. In full confidence of this unalterable truth, I 
 now move the first resolution. 
 
 81 : 19. Quoa felix faustwnque sit ! : And may the outcome 
 be happy and successful ! An old Roman invocation. 
 
 The first stone : Following the six chief resolutions, the cor- 
 ollary three were moved, divided into seven. Not one was passed. 
 
 81 : 27. Put and carried : in all probability, an editorial blun- 
 der. What was carried, was the intention of the previous question. 
 
 In English parliamentary practice, the previous question is 
 moved as a tactful way of rejecting a delicate measure. It is 
 moved by a member who intends to vote against his own motion. 
 The resolutions which, in this case, had the previous question put 
 on them were such as no rational being could directly oppose. The 
 resolutions which afforded ground for objection, however slight, 
 were squarely negatived. 
 
SECOND IMPRESSION. 
 
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