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

This clamour, which if it had been confined to the vulgar, had been, perhaps, of no great importance, nor could have promoted any of the designs of those by whom it was raised, has been mentioned in this house as an argument in favour of the motion which is now under the consideration of your lordships; and it has been urged that these measures cannot be proper, because all measures, by which his majesty's government is made unpopular, must in the end be destructive to the nation.

On this occasion, my lords, it is necessary to consider the nature of popularity, and to inquire how far it is to be considered in the administration of publick affairs. If by popularity is meant only a sudden shout of applause, obtained by a compliance with the present inclination of the people, however excited, or of whatsoever tendency, I shall without scruple declare, that popularity is to be despised; it is to be despised, my lords, because it cannot be preserved without abandoning much more valuable considerations. The inclinations of the people have, in all ages, been too variable for regard. But if by popularity be meant that settled confidence and lasting esteem, which a good government may justly claim from the subject, I am far from denying that it is truly desirable; and that no wise man ever disregarded it. But this popularity, my lords, is very consistent with contempt of riotous clamours, and of mistaken complaints; and is often only to be obtained by an opposition, to the reigning opinions, and a neglect of temporary discontents; opinions which may be inculcated without difficulty by favourite orators, and discontents which the eloquence of seditious writers may easily produce on ignorance and inconstancy.

How easily the opinions of the vulgar may be regulated by those who have obtained, by whatever methods, their esteem, the debate of this day, my lords, may inform us; since, if the measures against which this motion is intended, be really unpopular, as they have been represented, it is evident that there has been lately a very remarkable change in the sentiments of the nation; for it is yet a very little time since the repression of the insolence of France, and the relief of the queen of Hungary was so generally wished, and so importunately demanded, that had measures like these been then formed, it is not improbable that they might have reconciled the publick to that man whom the united voice of the nation has long laboured to overbear.

It is, indeed, urged with a degree of confidence, which ought, in my opinion, to proceed from stronger proof than has yet been produced, that no hostilities are intended; that our armaments on the continent are an idle show, an inoffensive ostentation, and that the troops of Hanover have been hired only to enrich the electorate, under the appearance of assisting the queen of Hungary, whom in reality they cannot succour without drawing upon their country the imperial interdict.

It has been alleged, my lords,-that these measures have been concerted wholly/or the advantage of Hanover; that this kingdom is to be sacrificed to the electorate, and that we are in reality intended to be made tributaries to a petty power.

In confirmation of these suggestions, advantage has been taken from every circumstance that could admit of misrepresentation. The constitution of the empire has been falsely quoted, to prove that they cannot act against the emperour, and their inactivity in Flanders has been produced as a proof, that they do not intend to enter Germany.

Whoever shall consult the constituent and fundamental pact by which the German form of government is established, will find, my lords, that it is not in the power of the emperour alone to lay any of the states of Germany under the ban; and that the electors are independent in their own dominions, so far as that they may enter into alliances with foreign powers, and make war upon each other.

It appears, therefore, my lords, that no law prohibits the elector of Hanover to send his troops to the assistance of the queen of Hungary; he may, in consequence of treaties, march into Germany, and attack the confederates of the emperour, or what is not now intended, even the emperour himself, without any dread of the severities of the ban.

Nor does the continuance of the forces in Flanders show any unwillingness to begin hostilities, or any dread of the power of either Prussia, whose prohibition is merely imaginary, or of France, who is not less perplexed by the neighbourhood of our army than by any other method that could have been taken of attacking her; for being obliged to have an equal force always in readiness to observe their motions, she has not been able to send a new army against the Austrians, but has been obliged to leave the emperour at their mercy, and suffer them to recover Bohemia without bloodshed, and establish themselves at leisure in Bavaria.

Nor is this, my lords, the only advantage which has been gained by their residence in Flanders; for the United Provinces have been animated to a concurrence in the common cause, and have consented so far to depart from their darling neutrality, as to send twenty thousand of their forces to garrison the barrier. Of which no man, I suppose, will say that it is not of great importance to the queen of Hungary, since it sets her free from the necessity of distracting her views, and dividing her forces for the defence of the most distant parts of her dominions at once; nor will it be affirmed, that this advantage could have probably been gained, without convincing our allies of our sincerity, by sending an army into the continent.

If it be asked, what is farther to be expected from these troops? it ought to be remembered, my lords, with how little propriety our ministers can be required to make publick a scheme of hostile operations, and how much we should expose ourselves to our enemies, should a precedent be established by which our generals would be incapacitated to form any private designs, and an end would be for ever put to military secrecy.

What necessity there can be for proposing arguments like these, I am not, indeed, able to discover, since the objections which have been made seem to proceed rather from obstinacy than conviction; and the reflections that have been vented seem rather the product of wit irritated by malevolence, than of reason enlightened by calm consideration. The ministers have been reproached with Hanoverian measures, without any proof that Hanover is to receive the least advantage; and have been charged with betraying their country by those who cannot show how their country is injured, nor can prove either that interest or faith would allow us to sit inactive in the present disturbance of Europe, or that we could have acted in any other manner with equal efficacy.

It is so far from being either evident or true, my lords, that Britain is sacrificed to Hanover, that Hanover is evidently hazarded by her union with Britain. Had this electorate now any other sovereign than the king of Great Britain, it might have been secure by a neutrality, and have looked upon the miseries of the neighbouring provinces without any diminution of its people, or disturbance of its tranquillity; nor could any danger be dreaded, or any inconvenience be felt, but from an open declaration in favour of the Pragmatick sanction.

Why the hire of the troops of any particular country should be considered as an act of submission to it, or of dependency upon it, I cannot discover; nor can I conceive for what reason the troops of Hanover should be more dangerous, or less popular, at this than at any former time, or why the employment of them should be considered as any particular regard. If any addition of dominion had been to be purchased for the electorate by the united arms of the confederate army, I should, perhaps, be inclined to censure the scheme, as contrary to the interest of my native country; nor shall any lord more warmly oppose designs that may tend to aggrandize another nation at the expense of this. But to hire foreigners, of whatever country, only to save the blood of Britons, is, in my opinion, an instance of preference which ought to produce rather acknowledgments of gratitude than sallies of indignation.

Upon the most exact survey of this debate, I will boldly affirm, that I never heard in this house a question so untenable in itself, so obstinately or so warmly debated; but hope that the sophistries which have been used, however artful, and the declamations which have been pronounced, however pathetick, will have no effect upon your lordships. I hope, that as the other house has already agreed to support the auxiliaries which have been retained, and which have been proved in this debate to be retained for the strongest reasons, and the most important purposes, your lordships will show, by rejecting this motion, that you are not less willing to concur in the support of publick faith, and that you will not suffer posterity to charge you with the exaltation of France, and the ruin of Europe.

[The question was then put, and determined in the negative, by 90 against 35.]

After the conclusion of this long debate, the ministry did not yet think their victory in repelling this censure sufficiently apparent, unless a motion was admitted, which might imply a full and unlimited approbation of their measures; and therefore the earl of SCARBOROUGH rose, and spoke to the following effect:—My lords, it has been justly observed in the debate of this day, that the opinions of the people of Britain are regulated in a great measure by the determinations of this house; that they consider this as the place where truth and reason obtain a candid audience; as a place sacred to justice and to honour; into which, passion, partiality, and faction have been very rarely known to intrude; and that they, therefore, watch our decisions as the great rules of policy, and standing maxims of right, and readily believe these measures necessary in which we concur, and that conduct unblameable which has gained our approbation.

This reputation, my lords, we ought diligently to preserve, by an unwearied vigilance for the happiness of our fellow-subjects; and while we possess it, we ought likewise to employ its influence to beneficial purposes, that the cause and the effect may reciprocally produce each other; that the people, when the prosperity which they enjoy by our care, inclines them to repose in us an implicit confidence, may find that confidence a new source of felicity; that they may reverence us, because they are secure and happy; and be secure and happy, because they reverence us.

This great end, my lords, it will not be very difficult to attain; the foundation of this exalted authority may easily be laid, and the superstructure raised in a short time; the one may be laid too deep to be undermined, and the other built too firmly to be shaken; at least they can be impaired only by ourselves, and may set all external violence at defiance.

To preserve the confidence of the people, and, consequently, to govern them without force, and without opposition, it is only necessary that we never willingly deceive them; that we expose the publick affairs to their view, so far as they ought to be made publick in their true state; that we never suffer false reports to circulate under the sanction of our authority, nor give the nation reason to think we are satisfied, when we are, in reality, suspicious of illegal designs, or that we suspect those measures of latent mischiefs with which we are, in reality, completely satisfied.

But it is not sufficient, my lords, that we publish ourselves no fallacious representations of our counsels; it is necessary, likewise, that we do not permit them to be published, that we obviate every falsehood in its rise, and propagate truth with our utmost diligence. For if we suffer the nation to be deceived, we are not much less criminal than those who deceive it; at least we must be confessed no longer to act as the guardians of the publick happiness, if we suffer it to be interrupted by the dispersion of reports which we know to be at once false and pernicious.

Of these principles, which I suppose will not be contested, an easy application may be made to the business of the present day. A question has been debated with great address, great ardour, and great obstinacy, which is in itself, though not doubtful, yet very much diffused; complicated with a great number of circumstances, and extended to a multitude of relations; and is, therefore, a subject upon which sophistry may very safely practise her arts, and which may be shown in very different views to those whose intellectual light is too much contracted to receive the whole object at once. It may easily be asserted, by those who have long been accustomed to affirm, without scruple, whatever they desire to obtain belief, that the arguments in favour of the motion, which has now been rejected by your lordships, were unanswerable; and it will be no hard task to lay before their audience such reasons as, though they have been easily confuted by the penetration and experience of your lordships, may, to men unacquainted with politicks, and remote from the sources of intelligence, appear very formidable.

It is, therefore, not sufficient that your lordships have rejected the former motion, and shown that you do not absolutely disapprove the measures of the government, since it may be asserted, and with some appearance of reason, that barely not to admit a motion by which all the measures of the last year would have been at once over-turned and annihilated, is no proof that they have been fully justified, and warmly confirmed, since many of the transactions might have been at least doubtful, and yet this motion not have been proper.

In an affair of so great importance, my lords, an affair in which the interest of all the western world is engaged, it is necessary to take away all suspicions, when the nation is about to be involved in a war for the security of ourselves and our posterity; in a war which, however prosperous, must be at least expensive, and which is to be carried on against an enemy who, though not invincible, is, in a very high degree, powerful. It is surely proper to show, in the most publick manner, our conviction, that neither prudence nor frugality has been wanting; that the inconveniencies which will be always felt in such contentions, are not brought upon us by wantonness or negligence; and that no care is omitted by which they are alleviated, and that they may be borne more patiently, because they cannot be avoided.

This attestation, my lords, we can only give by a solemn address to his majesty of a tendency contrary to that of the motion now rejected; and by such an attestation only can we hope to revive the courage of the nation, to unite those in the common cause of liberty whom false reports have alienated or shaken, and to restore to his majesty that confidence which all the subtilties of faction have been employed to impair. I, therefore, move, that an humble address be presented to his majesty, importing, "That in the unsettled and dangerous situation of affairs in Europe, the sending a considerable body of British forces into the Austrian Netherlands, and augmenting the same with sixteen thousand of his majesty's electoral troops, and the Hessians in the British pay, and thereby, in conjunction with the queen of Hungary's troops in the Low Countries, forming a great army for the service of the common cause, was a wise, useful, and necessary measure, manifestly tending to the support and encouragement of his majesty's allies, and the real and effectual assistance of the queen of Hungary, and the restoring and maintaining the balance of power, and has already produced very advantageous consequences."

The earl of OXFORD spoke next, to the following effect:—My lords, the necessity of supporting our reputation, and of preserving the confidence of the publick, I am by no means inclined to dispute, being convinced, that from the instant in which we shall lose the credit which our ancestors have delivered down to us, we shall be no longer considered as a part of the legislature, but be treated by the people only as an assembly of hirelings and dependants, convened at the pleasure of the court to ratify its decisions without examination, to extort taxes, promote slavery, and to share with the ministry the crime and the infamy of cruelty and oppression.

For this reason, it is undoubtedly proper, that we avoid not only the crime, but the appearance of dependence; and that every doubtful question should be freely debated, and every pernicious position publickly condemned; and that when our decisions are not agreeable to the opinion or expectations of the people, we should at least show them that they are not the effects of blind compliance with the demands of the ministry, or of an implicit resignation to the direction of a party. We ought to show, that we are unprejudiced, and ready to hear truth; that our determinations are not dictated by any foreign influence, and that it will not be vain to inform us, or useless to petition us.

In these principles I agree with the noble lord who has made the motion; but in the consequences which are on this occasion to be drawn from them, I cannot but differ very widely from him; for, in my opinion, nothing can so much impair our reputation, as an address like that which is proposed; an address not founded either upon facts or arguments, and from which the nation can collect only, that the protection of this house is withdrawn from them, that they are given up to ruin, and that they are to perish as a sacrifice to the interest of Hanover.

Let us consider what we are now invited to assert, and it will easily appear how well this motion is calculated to preserve and to advance the reputation of this house. We are to assert, my lords, the propriety of a new war against the most formidable power of the universe, at a time when we have been defeated and disgraced in our conquests with a kingdom of inferiour force. We are to declare our readiness to pay and to raise new taxes, since no war can be carried on without them, at a time when our commerce, the great source of riches, is obstructed; when the interest of debts contracted during a long war, and a peace almost equally expensive, is preying upon our estates; when the profits of the trade of future ages, and the rents of the inheritances of our latest descendants, are mortgaged; and what ought yet more to affect us, at a time when the outcry of distress is universal, when the miseries of hopeless poverty have sunk the nation into despair, when industry scarcely retains spirit sufficient to continue her labours, and all the lower ranks of mankind are overwhelmed with the general calamity.

There may, perhaps, be some among your lordships who may think this representation of the state of the publick exaggerated beyond the truth. There are many in this house who see no other scenes than the magnificence of feasts, the gaieties of balls, and the splendour of a court; and it is not much to be wondered at, if they do not easily believe what it is often their interest to doubt, that this luxury is supported by the distress of millions, and that this magnificence exposes multitudes to nakedness and famine. It is my custom, when the business of the senate is over, to retire to my estate in the country, where I live without noise, and without riot, and take a calm and deliberate survey of the condition of those that inhabit the towns and villages about me. I mingle in their conversation, and hear their complaints; I enter their houses, and find by their condition that their complaints are just; I discover that they are daily impoverished, and that they are not able to struggle under the enormous burdens of publick payments, of which I am convinced that they cannot be levied another year without exhausting the people, and spreading universal beggary over the nation.

What can be the opinion of the publick, when they see an address of this house, by which new expenses are recommended? Will they not think that their state is desperate, and that they are sold to slavery, from which nothing but insurrections and bloodshed can release them? If they retain any hopes of relief from this house, they must soon be extinguished, when they find in the next clause, that we are sunk to such a degree of servility, as to acknowledge benefits which were never received, and to praise the invisible service of our army in Flanders.

If it be necessary, my lords, to impose upon the publick, let us at least endeavour to do it less grossly; let us not attempt to persuade them that those forces have gained victories who have never seen an enemy, or that we are benefited by the transportation of our money into another country. If it be necessary to censure those noble lords who have supported the former motion, and to punish them for daring to use arguments which could not be confuted; for this is the apparent tendency of the present motion; let us not lose all consideration of ourselves, nor sacrifice the honour of the house to the resentment of the ministry.

For my part, my lords, I shall continue to avow my opinion in defiance of censures, motions and addresses; and as I struggled against the former ministry, not because I envied or hated them, but because I disapproved their conduct; I shall continue to oppose measures equally destructive with equal zeal, by whomsoever they are projected, or by whomsoever patronised.

Lord CARTERET spoke next, to the following purpose:—My lords, after so full a defence of the former motion as the late debate has produced, it is rather with indignation than surprise, that I hear that which is now offered. It has been for a long time the practice of those who are supported only by their numbers, to treat their opponents with contempt, and when they cannot answer to insult them; and motions have been made, not because they were thought right by those who offered them, but because they would certainly be carried, and would, by being carried, mortify their opponents.

This, my lords, is the only intent of the present motion which can promote no useful purpose, and which, though it may flatter the court, must be considered by the people as an insult; and therefore, though I believe all opposition fruitless, I declare that I never will agree to it.

And to show, my lords, that I do not oppose the ministry for the sake of obstructing the publick counsels, or of irritating those whom I despair to defeat; and that I am not afraid of trusting my conduct to the impartial examination of posterity, I shall beg leave to enter, with my protest, the reasons which have influenced me in this day's deliberation, that they be considered when this question shall no longer be a point of interest, and our present jealousies and animosities are forgotten.

[It was carried in the affirmative, by 78 against 35.]