Part 17

NOTE 33, p. 132.—Negotiations had been going on between the colonies and France for more than a year, though this fact, of course, was not known in England. Silas Deane had been appointed Commissioner to France even before the Declaration of Independence. In Nov. of 1776, Lee and Franklin were appointed by Congress to negotiate a treaty of friendship and commerce with the French king. But the French were wary of alliance, though they were willing to wink at the secret arrangements by which supplies were furnished by Beaumarchais. These supplies, furnished in the autumn of 1777, were detained, and did not reach America in time to prevent the terrible sufferings at Valley Forge in the following winter. When news of Burgoyne’s surrender reached France, the French Government no longer hesitated, and a final treaty by which France acknowledged the Independence of the United States was signed on the 6th of February, 1778. For most interesting and authentic details, see Parton’s “Life of Franklin,” vol. ii., ch. vii.

NOTE 34, p. 140.—The walls of the old room in which the House of Lords assembled were covered with tapestries, one of which represented the English fleet led out to conflict with the Spanish Armada by Lord Effingham Howard, an ancestor of Lord Suffolk.

NOTE 35, p. 160.—This argument of Mansfield drawn from the Navigation Acts is fully refuted by Burke in his speech on “American Taxation.” Burke takes the ground that none of these acts were passed for the sake of revenue, but that all of them were designed simply to give direction to trade. He also shows that there is a marked distinction between _external_ and _internal_ taxation. The whole of Burke’s speech may well be read with profit in connection with that of Mansfield.

NOTE 36, p. 164.—This reference is probably to James Otis’ volume published in London in 1765, entitled: “The Rights of the Colonies Asserted and Proved.” It had previously been published in Boston, after having been read in MS. in the Massachusetts House of Representatives. The instructions of May, 1764, contained in the appendix were drawn up by Samuel Adams. It is possible, however, that the orator referred to Otis’ “Vindication of the Conduct of the House of Representatives of the Province of Mass. Bay,” which had appeared in 1762, and which contained in a nutshell the whole American cause. John Adams said of it: “Look over the Declarations of Rights and Wrongs issued by Congress in 1774; look into the Declaration of Independence of 1776; look into the writings of Dr. Price and Dr. Priestley. Look into all the French Constitutions of Government; and, to cap the climax, look into Mr. Thomas Paine’s ‘Common Sense,’ ‘Crisis,’ and ‘Rights of Man,’ and what can you find that is not to be found in this Vindication of the House of Representatives?” During the same year also, Otis published “A Vindication of the British Colonies,” and “Considerations on behalf of the Colonists, in a letter to a Noble Lord.” The London reprint of the “Vindication of the British Colonies” was accompanied with the statement: “This tract is republished, _not for any excellence of the work, but for the eminence of the author_.” We see here the leader in the American disputes declaring the universal opinion of the Colonies against the authority of the British Parliament.

NOTE 37, p. 185.—This exordium is almost bad enough to justify Hazlitt’s remark: “Most of his speeches have a sort of parliamentary preamble to them; there is an air of affected modesty and ostentatious trifling in them; he seems fond of coquetting with the House of Commons, and is perpetually calling the Speaker out to dance a minuet with him before he begins.”

NOTE 38, p. 185.—This was an Act to restrain the Commerce of the Provinces of New England, and to confine it to Great Britain, Ireland, and the British West Indies.

NOTE 39, p. 187.—Reference is made to the Repeal of the Stamp Act, which took place in Rockingham’s Administration by a vote of 275 to 161.

NOTE 40, p. 189.—This rather striking thought was firmly implanted in Burke’s mind. In his paper on “Present Discontent,” he apologized for “stepping a little out of the ordinary sphere” of private people. In one of his letters he says: “We live in a nation where, at present, there is scarce a single head that does not teem with politics. Every man has contrived a scheme of government for the benefit of his fellow-subjects.”

NOTE 41, p. 191.—It must be confessed this is a little pompous. Burke’s scheme was simply to yield to the colonies what they claimed, and it was not good policy to pronounce such an encomium on it in advance. There were those who said: “On this simple principle of granting every thing required, and stipulating for nothing in return, we can terminate every difference throughout the world.”

NOTE 42, p. 191.—The Congress of Philadelphia in 1774 declared that after the Repeal of the Stamp Act the colonies “fell into their ancient state of unsuspecting confidence in the mother country.” Burke comments on this statement in his letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol in 1777.

NOTE 43, p. 192.—Lord North’s plan of conciliation, already described in the introduction to this speech.

NOTE 44, p. 193.—The address to the King declaring that rebellion existed in Massachusetts, requesting the King to take energetic measures to suppress it, and pledging the coöperation of Parliament.

NOTE 45, p. 196.—The computation carefully made by Mr. Bancroft (“Hist.,” 8vo ed., vol. iv., p. 128) more than justifies Burke’s figures. Bancroft gives the following:

+-----------+---------+---------- | White. | Black. | Total. -----+-----------+---------+---------- 1750 | 1,040,000 | 220,000 | 1,260,000 1754 | 1,165,000 | 260,000 | 1,425,000 1760 | 1,385,000 | 310,000 | 1,695,000 1770 | 1,850,000 | 462,000 | 2,312,000 1780 | 2,383,000 | 562,000 | 2,945,000 1790 | 3,177,257 | 752,069 | 3,927,326 -----+-----------+---------+----------

See Johnson’s “Taxation no Tyranny” (Works, x., 96) in which he savagely speaks of “3,000,000 Whigs, fierce for liberty, which multiply with the fecundity of their own rattlesnakes.” He thought the eggs should be destroyed.

NOTE 46, p. 197.—Reference to the legal maxim, “_De minimis non jurat lex_.”

NOTE 47, p. 198.—Mr. Glover who appeared at the bar to support a petition of the West Indian planters praying that peace might be concluded with the colonies.

NOTE 48, p. 199.—Davenant afterward published a somewhat important work entitled “Discourses on Revenue and Trade,” and it was probably the MS. of this to which Burke referred.

NOTE 49, p. 202.—Burke’s reasoning has been more than justified by subsequent history. Cobden: “Writings,” i., 98, more than fifty years after Burke spoke, declared: “The people of the United States constitute our largest and most valuable connection. The business we carry on with them is nearly twice as extensive as that with any other people.” The American official returns since 1850 show that more than one third of the imports came from England, and that more than one half of the exports go to England.

NOTE 50, p. 202.—A curious adaptation from Virgil. Ecl. iv., 26. If, while he was changing _parentis_ to _parentum_ he had omitted _poterit_, he would at least have left a good Latin sentence. But Burke quoted from memory and was often inexact, not only in the choice of words, but also in pronunciation. Harford relates that he was once indulging in some very severe animadversions on Lord North’s management of the public purse. While this philippic was going on, North appeared to be half-asleep, “heaving backward and forward like a great turtle.” Burke introduced the aphorism: _magnum vectígal est parsimonia_, putting a wrong accent on the second word and calling it _véctigal_. The scholarly ear of North was sufficiently attentive to catch the mistake, and he shouted out _vectígal_. “I thank the noble lord,” responded Burke, “for the correction, more particularly as it gives me the opportunity to repeat what he greatly needs to have reiterated upon him.” He then thundered out: “_Magnum vectígal est parsimonia_.”

NOTE 51, p. 206.—In allusion to the well-known story told at length by Valerius Maximus, lib. v., 7; and in briefer form by Pliny, “Nat. Hist.,” vii., 36.

NOTE 52, p. 208.—The whole of this magnificent passage was founded upon very substantial facts. Massachusetts had 183 vessels, carrying 13,820 tons in the North, and 120 vessels, carrying 14,026 tons in the South. It was in 1775, the very year of Burke’s speech, that English ships were first fitted out to follow the Americans into the fisheries of the South Seas. See _Quarterly Review_, lxiii., 318.

NOTE 53, p. 211.—At the time of the great struggle against the Stuarts. In the _Annual Register_, for 1775, p. 14, Burke says: “The American freeholders at present are nearly, in point of condition, what the English yeomen were of old when they rendered us formidable to all Europe, and our name celebrated throughout the world. The former, from many obvious circumstances, are more enthusiastical lovers of liberty than even our yeomen were.”

NOTE 54, p. 213.—The differences here indicated are fully explained in Marshall’s “American Colonies,” Story “On the Constitution,” Lodge’s “English Colonies in America,” and more briefly in vol. iv., chap, vi., of Bancroft. It is noteworthy that it was not in the most democratic forms of government that the most violent resolutions were passed. See _Ann. Reg._ for 1775, p. 6.

NOTE 55, p. 218.—General Gage had prohibited the _calling_ of town meetings after August 1, 1774. The meetings held before August 1st were adjourned over from time to time, and consequently there was no need of “_calling_” meetings. Gage complained that by such means they could keep their meetings alive for ten years. See Bancroft, vii., chap. viii., and _Ann. Reg._, 1775, p. 11.

NOTE 56, p. 219.—The “_ministrum fulminis alitem_” of Horace, bk. iv., ode i.

NOTE 57, p. 227.—In 1766, Lieutenant-Governor Fauquier had written to the Lords in Trade: “In disobedience to all proclamations, in defiance of law, and without the least shadow of right to claim or defend their property, people are daily going out to settle beyond the Alleghany Mountains.” Migration hither was prohibited. “But the prohibition only set apart the Great Valley as the sanctuary of the unhappy, the adventurous, and the free; of those whom enterprise, or curiosity, or disgust at the forms of life in the old plantations raised above royal edicts.” Bancroft, vi., 33.

NOTE 58, p. 233.—Reference is made to the brutal attack of Sir Edward Coke upon Sir Walter Raleigh, the details of which are given in Howell’s “State Trials,” ii., 7.

NOTE 59, p. 240.—Milton’s “Paradise Lost,” ii., 594.

NOTE 60, p. 240.—This passage has been much admired for the skill with which Burke excludes the general question of the right of taxation, and confines himself to the expediency of particular methods. But this was in accordance with all of Burke’s political philosophy. In his “Appeal from the Old to the New Whigs,” he announces the principle which governs him in all such cases: “Nothing universal can be rationally affirmed on any moral or any political subject. Pure metaphysical abstraction does not belong to these matters. The lines of morality are not like ideal lines of mathematics. They are broad and deep as well as long. They admit of exceptions; they demand modifications. These exceptions and modifications are not made by the process of logic, but by the rules of prudence. _Prudence is not only the first in rank of the virtues political and moral, but she is the director, the regulator, the standard of them all._”

NOTE 61, p. 244.—The pamphlet from which Lord North “seems to have borrowed these ideas,” was by Dean Tucker, a work to which, Dr. Johnson in “Taxation no Tyranny,” (Works, x., 139) pays his respects, and which Burke had alluded to in no very complimentary terms in his speech on “American Taxation.” But Mr. Forster, in his “Life of Goldsmith,” i., 412, speaks of Tucker as “the only man of that day who thoroughly anticipated the judgment and experience of our own on the question of the American colonies.” The fact is that Tucker was a “free trader,” and was in favor of the establishment of complete freedom of trade, as the best that could possibly be done with the colonies. To an account of Dean Tucker’s pamphlets several interesting pages are given in Smyth’s “Modern History,” Lecture xxxii., Am. ed., p. 571, _seq._

NOTE 62, p. 248.—The English settlers in Ireland were obliged to keep themselves within certain boundaries known as “The Pale.” They were distinct from the Irish, and were governed by English lords. By an act in the time of James I., the privileges of the Pale were first extended to the rest of Ireland.

NOTE 63, p. 249.—In 1612, Sir John Davis, who had been much in Ireland, and knew Irish affairs better than any other person in his time, published a book entitled: “Discoverie of the true Causes why Ireland was never entirely subdued until the beginning of his Majestie’s happy reign.”

NOTE 64, p. 250.—Under Henry III., Wales was ruled by its own Prince Llewellen, who secured the assistance of Henry against a rebellious son, and as a reward acknowledged fealty as a vassal. It was not till Edward I., that the conquest was completed. O’Connell once said: “Wales was once the Ireland of the English Government,” and then proceeded to apply to Ireland what Burke here says of Wales.—“O’Connell’s speech of Aug. 30, 1826.”

NOTE 65, p. 252.—When the reduction to order of Wales was found impossible by ordinary means, the English King granted to the Lords Marchers “such lands as they could win from the Welshmen.” On these lands the lords were allowed “to take upon themselves such prerogative and authority as were fit for the quiet government of the country.” About the castles of the Lords Marchers grew up the towns of Wales. Within their domains they exercised English laws; but on the unconquered lands the old Welsh laws still prevailed. The courts, therefore, had to administer both forms of law, and there was consequently great confusion even in the most peaceful times. There were fifteen acts of penal regulation, providing that no Welshman should be allowed to become a burgess, or purchase any land in town. Henry IV., ii., chaps. xii.-xx. In the time of Edward I., the special privileges of the Lords Marchers were swept away. See Stubbs’ “Con. Hist.,” 8vo ed., i., 514–520, and ii., 117–137; Scott’s “Betrothed,” and the Appendix to Pennant’s “Tour in Wales.”

NOTE 66, p. 254.—Horace, “Odes,” bk. i., 12, 27. The allusion is to the deification of Augustus and the superintending influence of Castor and Pollux. The passage was translated by Gifford thus:

“When their auspicious star To the sailor shines afar, The troubled waters leave the rocks at rest; The clouds are gone, the winds are still, The angry wave obeys their will, And calmly sleeps upon the ocean’s breast.”

NOTE 67, p. 258.—Milton’s “Comus,” l. 633, not quite correctly quoted.

NOTE 68, p. 261.—Horace, “Satir.,” ii., 2. “The precept is not mine. Ofellus gave it in his rustic strain irregular, but wise.”

NOTE 69, p. 261.—In allusion to the declaration in Exodus xx., 25: “If thou lift up thy tool upon it [the altar] thou hast polluted it.”

NOTE 70, p. 265.—In allusion to a statement that had been made by Grenville. Burke said in his speech on American taxation: “He has declared in this House an hundred times, that the colonies could not legally grant any revenues to the Crown.”

NOTE 71, p. 278.—This was in strict accordance with Burke’s political philosophy. In a letter to the Sheriff of Bristol, he wrote: “Of one thing I am perfectly clear, that it is not by deciding the suit, but by compromising the difference, that peace can be restored or kept.”

NOTE 72, p. 278.—Shak.: “Othello,” Act iii., Scene v. So at the beginning of his paper on the “Present Discontents,” Burke speaks of “reputation, the most precious possession of every individual.” In the fourth letter on a “Regicide Peace,” he said: “Our ruin will be disguised in profit, and the sale of a few wretched baubles will bribe a degenerate people to barter away the most precious jewel of their souls.”

NOTE 73, p. 279.—“I drew them with cords of a man, with bands of love.”—HOSEA, xi., 4.

NOTE 74, p. 279.—Another illustration of Burke’s habit of making use of the inestimable maxims of the great Greek politician.

NOTE 75, p. 282.—“Experiment upon a worthless subject” was a maxim among old scientific inquirers.

NOTE 76, p. 286.—A “Treasury Extent” was a writ of Commission for valuing lands and tenements for satisfying a Crown debt.

NOTE 77, p. 289.—The quotation is from Juvenal i., l. 90, and refers to the habit of the Roman gambler. Gifford renders the passage:

“For now no more the pocket’s stores supply The boundless charges of the desperate die, _The chest itself is staked_.”

NOTE 78, p. 291.—Milton’s Paradise Lost, iv., 106. This also is a misquotation:—_retract_ should be _recant_. Burke seldom took the trouble to verify his quotations, but relied upon a powerful, though slightly fallible, memory.

NOTE 79, p. 294.—This passage is perhaps one of the noblest and most characteristic of all Burke’s utterances. And yet, in all its magnificence it shows how largely the orator was indebted to his reading. Mr. E. J. Payne, as an illustration of the way in which Burke “repays his rich thievery of the Bible and the English poets,” has pointed out the sources from which the most striking expressions were consciously or unconsciously derived. The closing sentence in an adaptation from Virgil, Æn. vi., 726; “My trust is in her,” is from the Psalms; “Light as air,” etc., from Othello; “Grapple to you,” from Hamlet; “No force under heaven,” etc., from St. Paul; “Chosen race,” Tate & Brady; “Perfect obedience” and “mysterious whole,” from Pope. Most striking of all, the passage in which “the chosen race” is represented “turning their faces towards you,” is from 1. Kings, viii., 44–45. “If the people go out to battle, or whithersoever thou shall send them, and shall pray unto the Lord toward the city, which thou hast chosen, and toward the house that I have built in thy name, then hear thou in heaven their prayer and their supplication, and maintain their cause.”

NOTE 80, p. 295.—Until 1798 the Land Tax yielded from one third to one half of all the revenue; but in that year it was made permanent, and now yields only about one sixty-fourth.

NOTE 81, p. 295.—The Mutiny Bill plays a very curious part in English Constitutional usage. In the Declaration of Rights it was declared that “standing armies and martial law in peace, without the consent of Parliament, are illegal.” The “consent of Parliament” is now secured in the following manner: An appropriation is made to support such an army as is needed, but all of the provisions of the appropriating bill are limited _to one year_. In order to maintain even the nucleus of an army, therefore, it is absolutely necessary that Parliament should be in session every year. This is the only provision guaranteeing an annual assembling of Parliament.

NOTE 82, p. 296.—_Sursum Corda_: “let your hearts arise,” was the form of a call to silent prayer at certain intervals in the Roman Catholic service.

NOTE 83, p. 296.—_Let it be happy and prosperous_, was a form of prayer among the Romans at the beginning of an important undertaking.

Transcriber’s Notes

Punctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.

Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unbalanced quotation marks retained.

Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained; occurrences of inconsistent hyphenation have not been changed.