How long our merchants were plundered, our sailors enslaved, and our
colonies intimidated without resentment; how long the Spaniards usurped
the dominion of the seas, searched our ships at pleasure, confiscated
the cargoes without control, and tortured our fellow-subjects with
impunity, cannot but be remembered. Not only every gentleman in this
house, but every man in the nation, however indolent, ignorant, or
obscure, can tell what barbarities were exercised, what ravages were
committed, what complaints were made, and how they were received. It is
universally known that this gentleman, and those whom he has seduced by
pensions and employments, treated the lamentations of ruined families,
and the outcries of tortured Britons, as the clamours of sedition, and
the murmurs of malignity suborned to inflame the people, and embarrass
the government.

It is known, sir, that our losses were at one time ridiculed as below
the consideration of the legislature, and the distress of the most
useful and honest part of mankind was made the subject of merriment and
laughter; the awkward wit of all the hirelings of the town was exerted
to divert the attention of the publick, and all their art was employed
to introduce other subjects into conversation, or to still the
complaints which they heard with a timely jest.

But their wit was not more successful on this, than on other occasions;
their imaginations were soon exhausted, and they found, as at other
times, that they must have recourse to new expedients. The first
artifice of shallow courtiers is to elude with promises those complaints
which they cannot confute, a practice that requires no understanding or
knowledge, and therefore has been generally followed by the
administration. This artifice they quickly made use of, when they found