What may be hoped, sir, from a prince of wisdom and courage, at the head of a hundred and ten thousand regular troops, with eight millions in his treasury? How much he must necessarily add to the strength of any party in which he shall engage, is unnecessary to mention; it is evident, without proof, that nothing could so much contribute to the reestablishment of the house of Austria, as a reconciliation with this mighty prince, and that, to bring it to pass, would be the most effectual method of serving the unfortunate queen that requires our assistance.
Why we should despair, sir, of such a reconciliation I cannot perceive; a reconciliation equally conducive to the real interest of both parties. It may be proved, with very little difficulty, to the king of Prussia, that he is now assisting those with whom interests incompatible and religions irreconcilable have set him at variance, whom he can never see prosperous but by the diminution of his own greatness, and who will always project his ruin while they are enjoying the advantages of his victories. We may easily convince him that their power will soon become, by his assistance, such as he cannot hope to withstand, and show, from the examples of other princes, how dangerous it is to add to the strength of an ambitious neighbour. We may show him how much the fate of the empire is now in his hands, and how much more glorious and more advantageous it will be to preserve it from ruin, than to contribute to its destruction.
If by such arguments, sir, this potent monarch can be induced to act steadily in defence of the common cause, we may once more stand at the head of a protestant confederacy; of a confederacy that may contract the views and repress the ambition of the house of Bourbon, and alter their schemes of universal monarchy into expedients for the defence of their dominions.
But in transacting these affairs, let us not engage in any intricate treaties, nor amuse ourselves with displaying our abilities for negotiation; negotiation, that fatal art which we have learned as yet very imperfectly, and which we have never attempted to practise but to our own loss. While we have been entangled in tedious disquisitions, and retarded by artful delays, while our commissaries have been debating about what was only denied to produce controversies, and inquiring after that which has been hid from them only to divert their attention from other questions, how many opportunities have been lost, and how often might we have secured by war, what was, at a much greater expense, lost by treaties.
Treaties, sir, are the artillery of our enemies, to which we have nothing to oppose; they are weapons of which we know not the use, and which we can only escape by not coming within their reach. I know not by what fatality it is, that to treat and to be cheated, are, with regard to Britons, words of the same signification; nor do I intend, by this observation, to asperse the characters of particular persons, for treaties, by whomsoever carried on, have ended always with the same success.
It is time, therefore, to know, at length, our weakness and our strength, and to resolve no longer to put ourselves voluntarily into the power of our enemies: our troops have been always our ablest negotiators, and to them it has been, for the most part, necessary at last to refer our cause.
Let us, then, always preserve our martial character, and neglect the praise of political cunning; a quality which, I believe, we shall never attain, and which, if we could obtain, would add nothing to our honour. Let it be the practice of the Britons to declare their resolutions without reserve, and adhere to them in opposition to danger; let them be ambitious of no other elogies than those which may be gained by honesty and courage, nor will they then ever find their allies diffident, or their enemies contemptuous.
By recovering and asserting this character, we may become once more the arbiters of Europe, and be courted by all the protestant powers as their protectors: we may once more subdue the ambition of the aspiring French, and once more deliver the house of Austria from the incessant pursuit of those restless enemies.
The defence of that illustrious family, sir, has always appeared to me, since I studied the state of Europe, the unvariable interest of the British nation, and our obligations to support it on this particular occasion have already been sufficiently explained.
Whence it proceeded, sir, that those who now so zealously espouse the Austrian interest, have been so plainly forgetful of it on other occasions, I cannot determine. That treaties have been made very little to the advantage of that family, and that its enemies have been suffered to insult it without opposition, is well known; nor was it long ago that it was debated in this house, whether any money should be lent to the late emperour.