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AN ANSWER

TO THE

DEFENCE OF THE INQUIRY INTO THE REASONS OF THE
CONDUCT OF GREAT BRITAIN, &c.

IN A LETTER TO caleb d'Anvers, Esq.

SIR:

As soon as I heard that the author of the Inquiry* had condescended to take notice of a Letter which you thought fit to publish in your journal of the fourth of January last, I resolved to make my acknowldgements to him for so great an honor, and to desire you to convey them into the world. This duty should have been discharged immediately, if I had not been diverted from it by avocations of a very different nature; and if I had not observed, on a review of the present dispositions, that there was no reason in force to make a very speedy reply necessary. What I am going to say now will, I think, justify me for what I have said already, in the opinion of mankind; and at least in the secret thoughts even of the author and defender of the Inquiry: and as this effect of the little additional trouble I am about to give myself is the principal, nay, the sole good one which I dare expect, we are in time for that; and by consequence I shall not lose my labor by my delay.

This author hath thrown several matters in my way, to which

The following was the motto to this Answer to the Defence, &c. viz. "Nor can we conceive a more abject servility of conduct, than for people, so long famed for commerce and bravery, to see their darling good, and their peculiar glory, the pledge of their liberty, and life of all their property, just going to be forcibly and unrighteously torn from them; and tamely to look on without one struggle for so great a blessing, or one hearty effort against the invaders of it. What can we become, if we give our consent to such ruin by our own supine indolence and insensibility, and suffer ourselves to be stript of our boasted strength and ornament at once, by a nation, the most despicable of all nations under heaven; exposed to the contempt and insults of the world about us here below, and rendered utterly unworthy, by our own conduct, of the care of providence above us?"-INQUIRY, p. 86.

it is proper I should say something before I enter into that which is strictly the subject of our present dispute.

He declares upon this occasion, with all possible seriousness, that he hath not written, or dictated, or advanced, or, directly or indirectly, had the least part in the writing or publishing any paper, which hath appeared in the world, in any form, from the time of writing the Inquiry, and from some time before that, to the twentieth of January 1728-9." He makes this declaration, "and for that space of time, particularly with a view to papers printed in the London Journal; in all which he had been utterly unconcerned either directly or indirectly."

Far be it from me to question the truth of so solemn a declaration. I give entire credit to it; and I freely own that he hath reason to complain of me for insinuating, at least, that he had a hand in the London Journals. The little share I have had in the paper war hath not given me many opportunities of knowing the combatants; and the productions on one side, gave me little curiosity to inquire after the authors of them. But I found it universally affirmed, and no where contradicted, that this gentleman had a hand in the weekly papers just mentioned. The persons who recommended these papers, countenanced the opinion; and were glad, perhaps, that so considerable a name should give them an authority which might supply whatever else they wanted. Nay, I found amongst those, who were acquainted with this author, and profess a particular regard for him, some who were angry at him on this very account; some who were sorry for him; but none who doubted the truth of the fact. What may have given occasion to so general a concurrence, he can best tell. I urge these circumstances only to show, how I was led into an error. It was indeed error, not malice. But still I think myself obliged to take this occasion of asking his pardon; and I do it with all possible seriousness, as he made his declaration, and from the bottom of my heart; because I am as much convinced, that he neither abetted, encouraged, nor paid the authors of these papers, as I am that he was not himself the author of them.

It cannot be imputed to me, that I have any thing to answer for, on account of the personal severities which this author, in a very pathetic manner complains of. We must acknowledge, and we ought to lament, that our public papers have abounded in scurrility. One would be tempted to imagine, that the Saturnalia were held all the year round in Britain; for those who can do nothing but rail, have had their encouragements to write; and I am persuaded that this gentleman's candor will oblige him to confess, that nothing but a thorough contempt hinders complaints from being made against the writers of his own side,

much better grounded, and supported by much stronger instances, than he can produce against the writers of the opposite side, in his own, or in any other case. For my part, I should be extremely sorry to have it said of me, with truth, that I had railed at any author, instead of answering, or even in answering his book; and less than any would I be guilty of this crime, for such it is, towards one who defends, with so much uniformity of conduct, the liberty of the press, that corner-stone of public liberty. He who will support what hurts himself, because he thinks it the support of the whole liberty we enjoy, shall meet with nothing from me but that which he deserves from all mankind, the utmost respect, whenever he leaves me the power of showing it, consistently with the regard I owe to truth, and to my own necessary defence.

He will not, I hope, think it inconsistent with this respect for his person, or with that which I have for some of his writings, if I cannot bring myself up to have the same for his "Inquiry into the Reasons of the Conduct of Great Britain;" or for his "Defence of this Inquiry." He appears to have a paternal fondness for the first of these treatises, which amounts even to a partiality; the more surprising, because it is found in one who can boast so numerous and so fair an offspring. I should not have attempted to draw him out of an error, which he seems to indulge with so great a satisfaction, if he had not made it necessary for me. Since he hath done so, I will offer some observations on the Inquiry itself, before I come to the Defence.

The circumstance upon which he seems to triumph a little, (that the Inquiry was not answered,, )he will permit me to say is often a very equivocal proof of the merit of a book. The same mouths, it seems, which pronounced the Inquiry to be a mean and despicable performance, "have more than once expressed in print their earnest desire that some able hand would answer it." From what mouths he took this, I know not. But surely the testimony of those who desired some able hand would answer what they judged to be mean and despicable, is an odd testimony for him to quote; since it could proceed from nothing but a design to ridicule him.

Though the Inquiry was not answered in form, yet I believe that several, perhaps all, the points on which his system leaned, were occasionally examined, and sufficiently refuted by you, Mr. D'Anvers, and by others. If no more was done I take the reason to have been plainly this. The ministerial air of authority and information, assumed in it, made even those, on whom this air did not impose, judge that it was prudent to wait till time and events should open the scene a little more; and as the scene opened, they perceived that the Inquiry was daily answered, in

the most effectual manner, to their hands; so that the auihor might have waited all his life, perhaps, for something more of this sort if he had not thought fit to seize an opportunity of defending it, not more worthy of his notice, than several others before given him; and if my respect for him, and my desire to stand fair in his opinion had not determined me to make him a reply.

As to the effect of the Inquiry, which he thinks so considerable, that it "awakened multitudes out of a dull and languid state into life and vigor; and that it was not found to procure slumbers either to those who liked it, or to those who disliked it;" I, who was most certainly one of those who either liked or disliked it, can affirm with the greatest truth, that if it did not procure me slumbers, it did not keep me awake. Some of the facts advanced in it were strange and surprising; but then they were destitute of any proof, except the strong affirmations of the author, and collections of circumstances so extremely trivial, that they became burlesque as soon as they were seriously applied. A bare exposition of any real danger from the Pretender would have waked multitudes into life and vigor, though the Inquiry had never been written. But I apprehend that so many pages spent on Wharton's rambles, Ripperda's chit-chat, hearsays of what one great man wrote concerning what another great man said, three Muscovite ships coming to Spain, embarkations which were never made, and armies which were never assembled, could have no other effect than to compose multitudes into perfect tranquillity, and to confirm the opinion of their security on this head. Any surmises of an engagement, on the emperor's part, to assist Spain in the recovery of Gibraltar by force, could provoke no indignation, whatever else it might provoke, nor cause any alarm. We knew Gibraltar to be impregnable to the Spaniards, before Ripperda declared it to be so; and what assistance the emperor could give them towards reducing this place, unless he had in his service some of Mr. Waller's winged troops and Pegasean horse, we were not able to discover. As to the emperor's real engagement in this article towards Spain, and as to the engagements of Spain towards the emperor, on the article of trading to the West Indies, we soon knew what they were; and with this knowledge our alarm ceased. What was said in the long dissertations, about the Ostend company, caused likewise little or no emotion in us. Our interest was plainly not that of principals, till the Dutch had the address to make us so, by their accession to the treaty of Hanover; and the conduct of our own court, who beheld, with so much indifference, the rise and progress of this company, had taught us to be indifferent about it. These considerations, and many others which I omit, hindered

the Inquiry from having the effect, which this gentleman's paternal fondness makes him believe it had. The part, if I may have leave to say so, was overacted. But still I see no reason that he has to be concerned, because one way or other the end of writing it was answered. The Inquiry was the book of a day, like some little animals on the banks of the river Hypanis, which came to life in the morning, fulfilled all the ends of their creation, and died before night.

There is a point, on which the author and defender of the Inquiry values himself and his book very much; I mean the strict regard to truth which he assures us he observed in writing. Now, though I am ready to agree that this author has always a great regard to truth, yet I affirm that I could write a book as big as the Inquiry, filled with nothing but demonstrations of his errors in matters of fact. Too much confidence in the informations he received, too much haste in composing, and above all, that fire which is apt to overheat the imagination of polemical writers, must have caused these errors. It is impossible to account any other way, how a gentleman of nice honor, remarkable sincerity, and even exemplary piety, instead of making his propositions constantly the result of the evidence he found upon a thorough examination, true, should, through a whole book, have constantly suited his evidence to a certain set of propositions; and how facts and dates, as stubborn things as they are in the hands of other men, should grow soft as wax under his touch.

But it is not my design to enter into a disquisition of this sort. It would show ill nature, which I hope I have not; and it would be now of no use whatever. I must however defend myself, as unwilling as I am to offend him; and therefore since he contradicts what I said, viz. that "he had been given up in every material article of the Inquiry," I think myself obliged to prove it. "How easy are such words as these," says our author, "but how hard to support them?" Now I do assure him that these words, as far as they may be thought harsh or impolitic, will at no time fall easily from my tongue or pen; but he will find that it is easy for me, upon this occasion, to support them. I will confine myself to the four great points of danger, arising from the Vienna treaties, and mentioned already. Let us see whether he has been given up in them or not.

According to the Inquiry, we were in danger of losing not only our East and West India trade, but many other branches of the British trade, by the privileges supposed to be granted to the emperor's subjects, and from the enjoyments of which privileges we are debarred. Nay, it was very strongly insinuated that even the ruin of Britain was involved in this point. If this

VOL. I.-23

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