CHAP. II. 1739. quence of a war? Sir, Spain knows the confequence of a war in America; whoever gains, it must prove fatal to her; fhe knows it, and must therefore avoid it; but fhe knows England does not dare to make it; and what is a delay, which this magnified convention is to produce? Can it produce fuch conjunctures as thofe you loft, while you were giving kingdoms to Spain, to bring her back to that great branch of the Houfe of Bourbon, which is now thrown out to you with fo much terror? If this union be formidable, are we to delay only till it becomes more formidable, by being carried further into execution, and more ftrongly cemented?---But be it what it will, is this any longer a nation, or what is an English parliament, if with more fhips in your harbours than in all the navies of Europe, with above two millions of people in your American colonies, you will bear to hear of the expediency of receiving from Spain an infecure, unfatisfactory, dishonourable convention; Sir, I call it no more than it has been proved in this debate; it carries fallacy or downright fubjection in almoft every line. It has been laid open and exposed in so many strong and glaring 45 lights, that I can pretend to add nothing to CHAP. the conviction and indignation it has raised. Sir, as to the great national objection, the fearching your fhips, that favourite word, as it was called, is not omitted, indeed, in the preamble to the convention, but it stands there as the reproach of the whole, as the strongest evidence of the fatal fubmiffion that follows: On the part of Spain, an ufurpation, an inhuman tyranny, claimed and exercised over the American feas; on the part of England, an undoubted right, by treaties, and from God and nature, declared and afferted in the refolutions of Parliament, are referred to the difcuffion of plenipotentiaries. Sir, I fay this undoubted right is to be difcuffed and regulated. And if to regulate be to prefcribe rules (as in all conftruction it is), this right is, by the exprefs words of this convention, to be given up and facrificed; for it muft cease to be any thing from the moment it is fubmitted to limits. The court of Spain has plainly told you (as appears by papers upon the table) you fhall steer a due courfe: you fhall navigate by 1739. 1739. CHAP by a line to and from your plantations in America ; if you draw near to her coafts (though from the circumftances of that navigation you are under an unavoidable necesfity of doing it), you shall be seized and confifcated. If, then, upon thefe terms only fhe has confented to refer, what becomes at once of all the security we are flattered with, in confequence of this reference? Plenipotentiaries are to regulate finally the respective pretenfions of the two crowns, with regard to trade and navigation în America ; but does any man in Spain believe that these pretenfions will be regulated to the fatisfaction and honour of England? No, Sir, they conclude,and with reafon, from the high fpirit of their administration, from the fuperiority with which they have fo long treated you, that this reference muft end, as it has begun, to their honour and advantage. But gentlemen fay, the treaties fubfifting are to be the measure of this regulation. Sir, as to treaties, I will take part of the words of Sir William Temple, quoted by the hon. gentleman near me; It is in vain to negotiate and make treaties, if there is not dignity II. 1739 47 dignity and vigour to enforce the obfervance CHA P. of them; for under the mifconftruction and mifreprefentation of these very treaties fubfifting, this intolerable grievance has arisen; it has been growing upon you, treaty after treaty, through twenty years of negociation, and even under the difcuffion of commiffa. ries, to whom it was referred. You have heard from Captain Vaughan, at your bar, at what time these injuries and indignities were continued. As a kind of explanatory comment upon the convention, Spain has thought fit to grant you, as another infolent protest, under the validity and force of which she has suffered this convention to be proceeded upon, We'll treat with you, but we'll fearch and take your fhips; we'll fign a convention, but we'll keep your fubjects prisoners, prisoners in Old Spain; the West Indies are remote; Europe fhall be witness how we use you. As to the inference of an admiffion of our right not to be fearched, drawn from a reparation made for fhips unduly feized and confifcated, I think that argument is very inconclufive. The right claimed by Spain to fearch our fhips is one thing, and the excef fes CHAP. fes admitted to have been committed in con II. 1739. fequence of this pretended right, is another; are |