humility on your part, which is highly praiseworthy.

He goes on to explain, with the patient manner appropriate in dealing
with an importunate child, why George III's desires cannot possibly be
gratified. An ambassador, he assures him, would be useless, for:

If you assert that your reverence for our Celestial Dynasty fills
you with a desire to acquire our civilization, our ceremonies and
code of laws differ so completely from your own that, even if
your Envoy were able to acquire the rudiments of our
civilization, you could not possibly transplant our manners and
customs to your alien soil. Therefore, however adept the Envoy
might become, nothing would be gained thereby.

Swaying the wide world, I have but one aim in view, namely, to
maintain a perfect governance and to fulfil the duties of the
State; strange and costly objects do not interest me. I ... have
no use for your country's manufactures. ...It behoves you, O
King, to respect my sentiments and to display even greater
devotion and loyalty in future, so that, by perpetual submission
to our Throne, you may secure peace and prosperity for your
country hereafter.

He can understand the English desiring the produce of China, but feels
that they have nothing worth having to offer in exchange:

"Our Celestial Empire possesses all things in prolific abundance and
lacks no product within its own borders. There was therefore no need to
import the manufactures of outside barbarians in exchange for our own
produce. But as the tea, silk and porcelain which the Celestial Empire