For nothing, my lords, is now considered but senatorial interest, nor is any subordination desired but in the supreme council of the empire. For the establishment of this new regulation, the honours of every profession are prostituted, and every commission is become merely nominal. To gratify the leaders of the ministerial party, the most despicable triflers are exalted to an authority, and those whose want of understanding excludes them from any other employment, are selected for military commissions.
No sooner have they taken possession of their new command, and gratified with some act of oppression the wantonness of new authority, but they desert their charge with the formality of demanding a permission to be absent, which their commander dares not deny them. Thus, my lords, they leave the care of the troops, and the study of the rules of war, to those unhappy men who have no other claim to elevation than knowledge and bravery, and who, for want of relations in the senate, are condemned to linger out their lives at their quarters, amuse themselves with recounting their actions and sufferings in former wars, and with reading in the papers of every post, the cormissions which are bestowed on those who never saw a battle.
For this reason, my lords, preferments in the army, instead of being considered as proofs of merit, are looked on only as badges of dependence; nor can any thing be inferred from the promotion of an officer, but that he is in some degree or other allied to some member of the senate, or the leading voters of a borough.
After this manner, my lords, has the army been modelled, and on these principles has it subsisted for the last and the present reign; neither myself, nor any other general officer, have been consulted in the distribution of commands, or any part of military regulations. Our armies have known no other power than that of the secretary of war, who directs all their motions, and fills up every vacancy without opposition, and without appeal.
But never, my lords, was his power more conspicuous, than in raising the levies of last year; never was any authority more despotically exerted, or more tamely submitted to; never did any man more wantonly sport with his command, or more capriciously dispose of posts and preferments; never did any tyrant appear to set censure more openly at defiance, treat murmurs and remonstrances with greater contempt, or with more confidence and security distribute posts among his slaves, without any other reason of preference than his own uncontroulable pleasure.
And surely no man, my lords, could have made choice of such wretches for military commands, but to show that nothing but his own private inclinations should influence his conduct, and that he considered himself as supreme and unaccountable: for we have seen, my lords, the same animals to-day cringing behind a counter, and to-morrow swelling in a military dress; we have seen boys sent from school in despair of improvement, and intrusted with military command; fools that cannot learn their duty, and children that cannot perform it, have been indiscriminately promoted; the dross of the nation has been swept together to compose our new forces, and every man who was too stupid or infamous to learn or carry on a trade, has been placed, by this great disposer of honours, above the necessity of application, or the reach of censure.
Did not sometimes indignation, and sometimes pity, check the sallies of mirth, it would not be a disagreeable entertainment, my lords, to observe, in the park, the various appearances of these raw commanders, when they are exposing their new scarlet to view, and strutting with the first raptures of sudden elevation; to see the mechanick new-modelling his mien, and the stripling tottering beneath the weight of his cockade; or to hear the conversation of these new adventurers, and the instructive dialogues of schoolboys and shopkeepers.
I take this opportunity, my lords, of clearing myself from any suspicion of having contributed, by my advice, to this stupendous collection. I only once interposed with the recommendation of a young gentleman, who had learned his profession in two campaigns among the Muscovians, and whom yet neither his own desert, nor my patronage could advance to a commission. And, I believe, my lords, all the other general officers were equally unconsulted, and would, if their advice had been asked, equally have disapproved the measures that have been pursued.
But thus, my lords, were our new regiments completed, in which, of two hundred and fifty officers who have subsisted upon half-pay, only thirty-six have been promoted, though surely they might have pleaded a juster claim to employment, who had learned their profession in the service of their country, and had long languished in penury, than those who had neither knowledge nor capacity, who had neither acted nor suffered any thing, and who might have been destined to the hammer or the plough, without any disreputation to their families, or disappointment to themselves.
I have been told, indeed, my lords, that to some of these officers commissions were offered, which they refused, and for this refusal every reason is alleged but the true: some, indeed, excused themselves as disabled by age and infirmities from military service; nor can any objection be made to so just a plea. For how could those be refused in their age the comforts of ease and repose, who have served their country with their youth and vigour?