on the head of the present emperor, and his brother the emperor Joseph had lived, would our danger from the union of these two brothers not have been at least as great as that which is apprehended from the union of the present emperor, and of the present king of Spain, rivals almost from their cradles, and by a long course of opposition, such inveterate enemies, that they could hardly be kept, as the inquirer assures us, "within the bounds of common decency towards one another, by all the address of two powerful mediators in a public treaty?" Might not the same address, that threw these enemies into one another's arms, (for it will appear they did not run thither so unaccountably,) and united them in designs destructive to the commerce and rights of other nations, have succeeded equally well between the two brothers, especially since, in this case, there would have been but half the work to do? The union would have been formed to our hands, and our address could only have been shown, in giving such proper provocations, as might have inspired the designs. Would Charles have been less favorable to the trade of his brother's subjects, at any place in the Austrian dominions, than Philip shows himsslf to the trade of the subjects of Charles? Would Joseph not have concurred to assist his brother to regain Gibraltar, and the island of Minorca, at least, as zealously as we can suppose that Charles concurs to assist Philip, either by good offices, or, if you please, to have it so, by force of arms? Would not a league between the two brothers have been as much a popish league as that which we are so much alarmed at, between the surviving brother and the present king of Spain? Would not the first have made use of the Pretender, as the latter is said to do, and as every prince or state, with whom we happen to be at variance, may be provoked to do? In short, I may safely challenge the author of the inquiry, as great a causist as he is, to show any difference between the two cases which I have compared together, except this, that we might have been exposed to greater dangers from that settlement of Europe, which we fought to bring about, than we are, or can probably be exposed to, from that which we were so solicitous to prevent. But the case is still stronger than I have put it. For even after the death of the emperor Joseph, his present imperial majesty continued his claim to the whole Spanish monarchy; and you, and I, and many of us, continued to support his claim, and opposed with all our force the negotiations of peace, which were begun upon a different principle. Happily we failed of success. The many, who remonstrated, "That we were hastening apace to make him a power too great and too formidable; and that we should find in him, at last, the enemy we then dreaded only in another," pre vailed. Had they not, in what a condition should we have been at this time? Would the emperor have been more grateful, or less powerful, with the crown of Spain and the Indies, added to so many others? If the union between him and the king of Spain is so formidable to us, how much more reason should we have had to apprehend the consequences to our trade, and in the end, to our liberties and our religion themselves, if these divided powers had been united in the same ungrateful person, as it is the mode at present to call the emperor? If Don Carlos should marry the eldest arch-duchess, if the emperor should die without issue male, if the king of France should die without issue male, if the prince of Asturias should die without issue male, and the princes of the blood in France and Spain should not support the validity of the renunciations, all which is within the bounds of possibility, "Don Carlos may be at once emperor, king of France, and king of Spain; and have the vast strength and riches of these powers united and centered in him." This terrible object stares our speculative inquirer in the face, and disturbs his head. It disturbs, very probably, those excellent heads, who set him a scribbling, who can see so far into futurity at present; and who, not very long ago, were unable to discern the nearest and most probable events. Let us consider now, what consequence of this kind might have happened, if, for securing a balance of power in Europe, the present emperor had been likewise king of Spain. If then the king of France, instead of marrying the daughter of Stanislaus, had married the eldest daughter of the emperor, which surely had been within the bounds of possibility, there would remain but one chance at this time, viz. the emperor having a son, to save us from the combination of such a power, as would in reality form what we commonly, though improperly, call universal monarchy; since there would be nothing else, which could hinder Louis the Fifteenth, from being king of France, of Spain, and of the West Indies, master of all the Austrian dominions, and, by consequence, emperor. The truth I would inculcate by what I have said is this, that as the partition treaty threw too much weight into the scale of Bourbon, to the destruction of the balance of power in Europe; so the necessary consequence of the war we made to restore this balance must have been, if we had succeeded according to our desires, to destroy it again, by throwing too much weight into the scale of Austria. This has been proved by the event, and the inquirer demonstrates it, or he demonstrates nothing. As far, therefore, as we have brought this deduction, that is, to the end of the last war, it is manifest that the notion of preserving a balance of power in Europe has, for the reasons touched upon above, and which every man will extend in his own thoughts, proved to us like an ignis fatuus; in the pursuit of which we have been led from difficulty to difficulty, and from danger to danger. If we inquire, whether the treaties of Utrecht and Baden did afford us an opportunity of correcting our errors, and of profiting by our experience, it will be found that they did; since all the points, which had been in contest were then settled, and this settlement acquiesced in by all the parties to the war, except the emperor, who kept up still his claim against Philip the Fifth. But the keeping up this claim could not have endangered the public tranquillity. He was unable to attack Spain for want of a maritime force, or even Sicily, which was covered besides by the guaranty of the neutrality of Italy; and this neutrality served. likewise to hinder Spain from attacking him. There might have been a war of the pen, and there could have been no other between them. At the worst, if the king of Spain had invaded any part of Italy, the guarantees of the neutrality might easily have prevented such an attempt; and in so doing they would have observed the treaties, and kept the peace, far from breaking either one or the other. In such a state of foreign affairs, we had certainly an opportunity of looking carefully after our own. The king of Spain had no pretence to ask for any alteration in the settlement so lately established with his own consent; and the emperor could not have complained of his majesty for observing treaties, which he would not have made, but which he found made; nor for refusing to enter into a new war on this account. Whether we improved this opportunity, or not, what our present condition is, and by what steps we have been reduced to it, I leave to the inquiry of some person more capable than myself. Let it suffice, that I have endeavored to remove some delusions, which have affected even men of the best understandings, and the best intentions; and to prepare the minds of my countrymen to consider, at this critical point of time, what our national interest really is, without being biassed in their judgments by what they may have thought of it on any former occasions. I am, most noble Sir, your honor's most devoted serv't. February 3, 1726-7. POSTSCRIPT. JUST after I had sent these sheets to the press, a paper, entitled, "A letter to the Occasional Writer," was brought to me. I have read this stiff pedantic piece, with more attention than it deserves, tho' I read it cursorily; and notwithstanding the pains which the author takes to pass for you, I am ready to acquit you of the scandal. You would certainly have written better, and your pen at least would not have appeared so near a-kin to that of the Craftsman Extraordinary. Who this author supposes the Occasional Writer to be, I cannot guess. Such a wretch as he describes is, I believe, to be found nowhere, nor even such an image of guilt and misery anywhere, except in the horrors of his own mind. I shall, therefore, with a decent contempt for this scurrilous scribbler, and without any concern about his imaginary correspondent, continue these inoffensive letters, in great tranquillity and sedateness, as often as occasion invites me, or as I find myself in the humor. THE OCCASIONAL WRITER. NUMBER III. TO THE SAME. -Quis te, juvenum confidentissime, nostras Jussit adire domos? Quidve hinc petis? inquit. At ille, MOST NOBLe Sir: WHEN I Wrote the postscript to my last letter, I believed firmly that the answer to the Occasional Writer was neither written by you, nor published by your order. Many considerations determined me to this opinion. For instance: I could not think, that in order to vent yourself in a fit of railing, you would draw a picture out of your own imagination, which cannot pass for that of the person who wrote to you, even in the low and vile character he assumed, and which you will hardly venture to own that you meant to be the resemblance of any man in Britain. I could not persuade myself that you would give occasion, as I apprehend very much that you have done, to the drawing of another picture after the life, which no one will mistake, and which you will not be curious to place in your collection of paintings. I have, with the rest of mankind, a great regard for some of your friends; but I have, with the rest of mankind likewise, a great regard for your particular enemies, among whom it seemed impossible to me that you, who know them so well, should presume to find either slaves or criminals, or insolvent debtors. I dare affirm, that there is not one of them, who ever "mortgaged his estate for more than "its value, or reduced himself near the necessity of living by con"tribution." These are some of the motives which induced me to acquit you of the scandal, as I then thought it, of writing this paper. But, upon better information, and farther reflection, I have changed my opinion; and I see nothing inconsistent with my respect for you, in believing that you did write it. As great an advantage as it is in all the affairs of life for a man |