The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. Volume 11. Samuel Johnson

much his secret machinations have hindered our success, to expect or hope that we should meet here to return thanks for the management of the war; of a war in which nothing has been attempted by his direction that was likely to succeed, and in which no advantage has been gained, but by acting without orders, and against his hopes.

      That I do not charge him, sir, without reason, or invent accusations only to obstruct his measures, or to gratify my own resentment; that I do not eagerly catch flying calumnies, prolong the date of casual reproaches, encourage the malignity of the envious, or adopt the suspicions of the melancholy; that I do not impose upon myself by a warm imagination, and endeavour to communicate to others impressions which I have only received myself from prejudice and malignity, will be proved from the review of his conduct since the beginning of our dispute with Spain, in which it will be found that he has been guilty, not of single errours, but of deliberate treachery; that he has always cooperated with our enemies, and sacrificed to his private interest the happiness and the honour of the British nation.

      How long our merchants were plundered, our sailors enslaved, and our colonies intimidated without resentment; how long the Spaniards usurped the dominion of the seas, searched our ships at pleasure, confiscated the cargoes without control, and tortured our fellow-subjects with impunity, cannot but be remembered. Not only every gentleman in this house, but every man in the nation, however indolent, ignorant, or obscure, can tell what barbarities were exercised, what ravages were committed, what complaints were made, and how they were received. It is universally known that this gentleman, and those whom he has seduced by pensions and employments, treated the lamentations of ruined families, and the outcries of tortured Britons, as the clamours of sedition, and the murmurs of malignity suborned to inflame the people, and embarrass the government.

      It is known, sir, that our losses were at one time ridiculed as below the consideration of the legislature, and the distress of the most useful and honest part of mankind was made the subject of merriment and laughter; the awkward wit of all the hirelings of the town was exerted to divert the attention of the publick, and all their art was employed to introduce other subjects into conversation, or to still the complaints which they heard with a timely jest.

      But their wit was not more successful on this, than on other occasions; their imaginations were soon exhausted, and they found, as at other times, that they must have recourse to new expedients. The first artifice of shallow courtiers is to elude with promises those complaints which they cannot confute, a practice that requires no understanding or knowledge, and therefore has been generally followed by the administration. This artifice they quickly made use of, when they found that neither the merchants nor the nation were to be silenced by an affectation of negligence, or the sallies of mirth; that it was no longer safe to jest upon the miseries of their countrymen, the destruction of our trade, and the violation of our rights, they condescended, therefore, to some appearances of compassion, and promised to exert all their influence to procure redress and security.

      That they might not appear, sir, to have made this promise only to free themselves from present importunity, they set negotiations on foot, despatched memorials, remonstrances, propositions, and computations, and with an air of gravity and importance, assembled at proper times to peruse the intelligence which they received, and to concert new instructions for their ministers.

      While this farce was acted, sir, innumerable artifices were made use of to reconcile the nation to suspense and delay. Sometimes the distance of the Spanish dominions in America retarded the decision of our claims. Sometimes the dilatory disposition of the Spaniards, and the established methods of their courts, made it impossible to procure a more speedy determination. Sometimes orders were despatched to America in favour of our trade, and sometimes those orders were neglected by the captains of the Spanish ships, and the governours of their provinces; and when it was inquired why those captains and governours were not punished or recalled, we were treated with contempt, for not knowing what had been so lately told us of the dilatory proceedings of the Spanish courts.

      In the mean time our merchants were plundered, and our sailors thrown into dungeons; our flag was insulted, and our navigation restrained, by men acting under the commission of the king of Spain; we perceived no effect of our negotiations but the expense, and our enemies not only insisted on their former claims, but prosecuted them with the utmost rigour, insolence, and cruelty.

      It must, indeed, sir, be urged in favour of our minister, that he did not refuse any act of submission, or omit any method of supplication by which he might hope to soften the Spaniards; he solicited their favour at their own court, he sent commissaries into their country, he assisted them in taking possession of dominions, to which neither we nor they have proved a right; and he employed the navies of Britain to transport into Italy the prince on whom the new-erected kingdom was to be conferred.

      Well might he expect that the Spaniards would be softened by so much kindness and forbearance, and that gratitude would at length induce them to spare those whom no injuries or contempt had been able to alienate from them, and to allow those a free course through the seas of America, to whom they had been indebted for an uninterrupted passage to the possession of a kingdom.

      He might likewise urge, sir, that when he was obliged to make war upon them, he was so tender of their interest, that the British admiral was sent out with orders rather to destroy his own fleet than the galleons, which, in appearance, he was sent to take, and to perish by the inclemency of the climate, rather than enter the Spanish ports, terrify their colonies, or plunder their towns.

      But to little purpose, sir, did our minister implore the compassion of the Spaniards, and represent the benefits by which we might claim it; for his compliance was by the subtle Spaniards attributed, not to kindness, but to fear; and it was therefore determined to reduce him to absolute slavery, by the same practices which had already sunk him to so abject a state.

      They therefore treated our remonstrances with contempt, continued their insolence and their oppressions, and while our agent was cringing at their court with fresh instructions in his hand, while he was hurrying with busy looks from one grandee to another, and, perhaps, dismissed without an audience one day, and sent back in the midst of his harangue on another, the guardships of the Spaniards continued their havock, our merchants were ruined, and our sailors tortured.

      At length, sir, the nation was too much inflamed to be any longer amused with idle negotiations, or trifling expedients; the streets echoed with the clamours of the populace, and this house was crowded with petitions from the merchants. The honourable person, with all his art, found himself unable any longer to elude a determination of this affair. Those whom he had hitherto persuaded that he had failed merely for want of abilities, began now to suspect that he had no desire of better success; and those who had hitherto cheerfully merited their pensions by an unshaken adherence to all his measures, who had extolled his wisdom and his integrity with all the confidence of security, began now to be shaken by the universality of the censures which the open support of perfidy brought upon them. They were afraid any longer to assert what they neither believed themselves, nor could persuade others to admit. The most indolent were alarmed, the most obstinate convinced, and the most profligate ashamed.

      What could now be done, sir, to gain a few months, to secure a short interval of quiet, in which his agents might be employed to disseminate some new falsehood, bribe to his party some new vindicators, or lull the people with the opiate of another expedient, with an account of concessions from the court of Spain, or a congress to compute the losses, and adjust the claims of our merchants?

      Something was necessarily to be attempted, and orders were therefore despatched by our minister, to his slave at the court of Spain, to procure some stipulations that might have at least the appearance of a step towards the conclusion of the debate. His agent obeyed him with his usual alacrity and address, and in time sent him, for the satisfaction of the British people, the celebrated convention.

      The convention, sir, has been so lately discussed, is so particularly remembered, and so universally condemned, that it would be an unjustifiable prodigality of time to expatiate upon it. There were but few in the last senate, and I hope there are none in this, who did not see the meanness of suffering incontestable claims to be disputed by commissaries, the injustice of the demand which was made upon the South-sea company, and the contemptuous insolence of amusing us with the shadow of a stipulation, which was to