referve, with thofe very moderate conditions, on which his Majefty would most gladly have laid down his arms.

The Catholic King communicated to the court of London the affurances he had received from his Majefty; and he urged that court to perfect the reconciliation which he had long fo earneftly affected to defire. But the English Minifter, although conftantly feigning a defire of peace, never returned an ingenuous anfwer to the King of Spain, but was perpetually infulting his Catholic Majefty with a tender of inadmiflible propofitions, quite foreign to the fubject of difpute.

It was now clear, from the most indifputable evidence, that England did not wish for peace, and that the negociated for no other purpose but to gain time to make the neceffary preparations for war. The King of Spain was perfectly fenfible of this truth; nor was he lefs fenfible how much his own dignity was committed; yet his heart anticipated the calamities of war, and he forgot his own wrongs in his anxious with for peace. He even fuggefted a new plan of a ceffation of arms for a term of years. This plan was perfectly agreeable to his Majefty, on condition that the United States of America fhould be comprized in the propofal; and that, during the truce, they fhould be treated as independent. To render it more eafy for the King of England to fubfcribe to this effential ftipulation, his Majefty confented that he fhould either treat immediately with Congrefs, or through the mediation of the King of Spain.

In confequence of thefe over

tures, his Catholic Majefty dif patched his plan to the court of London. Befides the time limited for the fufpenfion of hoftilities, (during which the United States were to be confidered as independent de facto) his Catholic Ma jefty took it on himself to propofe, relative to America, that each party fhould have the poffeffion of what they occupied at the time of figning the treaty of fufpenfion, guaranteed to them. Such infinite pains did the King of Spain take to ftop the effufion of human blood!

There is not a doubt but that thefe conditions muft appear, to every well-judging perfon, fuch as would have been accepted; they were, however, formally rejected by the court of London; nor has that court fhewn any difpofition to peace, unless on the abfurd condition that his Majefty fhould abandon the Americans, and leave them to themselves.

After this afflicting declaration, the continuation of the war is be come inevitable; and, therefore, his Majefty has invited the Catholic King to join him, in virtue of their reciprocal engagements, to avenge their respective injuries, and to put an end to that tyrannical empire which England has ufurped and pretends to maintain upon the ocean.

This fuccinct exposure of the political views, and the progreffive feries of events which have occafioned the prefent rupture between the courts of Verfailles and London, will enable all Europe to draw a parallel between the conduct of his Majefty and that of the King of England; to render juftice to the purity and directnes

of

pulous attention, to the complaints and reprefentations of the powers, his neighbours or allies; ftifle in the beginning all grounds of quarrel that might embitter or alienate the minds of men; to turn afide the fcourge of war, by every expedient compatible with the dignity of the Sovereign of a refpectable nation; and to infpire all people with a juft confidence on the political fyftem of a court which detefted war, without fearing it; which employed no other means than thofe of reafon and fincerity, and which had no other object but the general tranquillity. In the midft of this calm, the first sparks of difcord were kindled in America. The intrigues of a few bold and criminal leaders, who abused the credulous fimplicity of their countrymen, infenfibly feduced the greatest part of the English Colonies to raise the standard of revolt against the Mother Country, to which they were indebted for their existence and their happiness. The court of Verfailles eafily forgot the faith of treaties, the duties of allies, and the right of Sovereigns, to endeavour to profit of circumftances which appeared favourable to its ambitious defigns. It did not blush to debafe its dignity, by the fecret connections it formed with rebellious fubjects; and, after having exhausted all the fhameful refources of perfidy and diffimulation, it dared to avow, in the face of Europe (full of indignation at its conduct) the folemn treaty which the Minifters of the Molt Chriftian King had figned with the dark agents of the English Colonies, who founded their pretended independence on nothing but the daringness of their revolt.

The offenfive Declaration which the Marquis de Noailles was ordered to make to the court of London, on the 13th of March, in the last year, authorized his Majefty to repel, by force of arms, the unheard-of infult that was of fered to the honour of his crown; and the King remembered, on that important occafion, what he owed his fubjects and himself. The fame fpirit of imposture and ambition continued to reign in the councils of France.-Spain, who has, more than once, repented having neglected her true interests, to follow blindly the deftructive projects of the elder branch of the House of Bourbon, was engaged to change the part of mediator for that of enemy of Great Britain. The calamities of war are multiplied, but the court of Versailles hath, hitherto, nothing to boast of the fuccefs of its military operations; and Europe knows well how to rate those naval victories, which exift no where but in the Gazettes and Manifeftos of pretended conquerors.

Since war and peace impofe on nations duties entirely different, and even oppofite, it is indifpenfibly neceflary to diftinguifh, in reafoning as well as in conduct, the two conditions: but in the last Manifefto, published by France, thefe two conditions are perpetually confounded: the pretends to juftify her conduct in making the belt, by turns, nay, almoft at the fame time, of thofe rights which an enemy only is permitted to claim, and of thofe maxims which regulate the obligations and procedure of national friendship. The fineffe of the court of Verfailles, in blending inceffantly two fuppofitions which have no connec

tion, is the natural confequence of a falfe and a treacherous policy, which cannot bear the light of the day. The fentiments and conduct of the King have nothing to fear from the most severe fcrutiny; but, on the contrary, invites it to dif. tinguish clearly what his enemies have confounded with fo much artifice. Juftice alone can speak, without fear, the language of reafon and truth.

The full juftification of his Majesty, and the indelible condemnation of France, may be reduced to the proof of two fimple and almost felf-evident principles.First, That a profound, permanent, and, on the part of England, a fincere and true peace, fubfifted between the two nations, when France formed connections with the revolted Colonies, fecret at first, but afterwards public and avowed.-Second, That according to the best acknowledged maxims of the rights of nations, and even according to the tenor of treaties actually fubfifting between the two crowns, thefe connections might be regarded as an infraction of the peace; and the public avowal of thefe connections was equivalent to a declaration of war on the part of the Moft Chriftian King. This is perhaps the first time that a refpectable nation had an occafion to prove two truths fo inconteftible, the memory of which is already acknowledged by every difinterefted and unprejudiced perfon.

"When Providence called the King to the throne, France enjoyed a moft profound peace." Thefe are the expreffions of the laft Manifefto of the court of Verfailles, which easily remembers the folemn affurances of a fincere friendhip,

and the moft pacific difpofition which it received from his Britannic Majefty, and which were often renewed by the intervention of Ambaffadors to the two courts, during four years, until the fatal and decifive moment of the Declaration of the Marquis de Noailles. The queftion then is to prove, that, during this happy time of general tranquillity, England concealed a fecret war under the appearance of peace; and that her unjust and arbitrary procedure was carried to fuch a pitch, as to render lawful, on the part of France, the boldelt fteps which are permiffible only in a declared enemy. To attain this object, griefs clearly articulated, and folidly established, fhould be produced before the tribunal of Europe. This great tribunal will require formal and perhaps repeated proofs of the injury of the complaint of a refufal of competent fatisfaction, and of a proteftation of the injured party, that it held itself highly offended by fuch refufal, and that it fhould look upon itself hereafter as releafed from the du ties of friendship, and the bonds of treaties. Thofe nations which refpect the fanctity of oaths, and the advantages of peace, are the floweft to catch hold of opportunities which feem to difcharge them from a facred and folemn obligation; and it is but with trembling that they dare to renounce the friendship of powers, from which they have long borne injuftice and infult.

But the court of Verfailles hath been either ignorant of thefa wife and falutary principles, or it hath defpiled them; and, instead of fixing the foundations of a julk and legitimate war, it hath con

tented

tented itfelf to fpread through every page of its Manifefto general and vague complaints, expreffed with exaggerations in a metaphorical ftyle. It goes above threefcore years back to accufe England of her want of care to ratify fome commercial regulations, fome articles of the treaty of Utrecht. It prefumes to reproach the King's minifters with ufing the language of haughtinefs and ambition, without condefcending to the duty of proving imputations as unlikely as they are odious. The free fuppofitions of the ambition and infincerity of the court of London, are confeffedly healed up, as if they feared to be difcriminated; the pretended infults which the commerce, the flag, and the territories of France, have undergone, are infinuated in a very obfcure manner, and at laft there efcapes an avowal of the engagement which the Most Christian King had already made with Spain, "to avenge their refpective wrongs, and put bounds to the tyrannical empire which England had ufurped, and pretended to maintain over every fea."

It is difficult to encounter phan toms, or to answer clofely and precifely to the language of declamation. The juft confidence of the King would doubtless defire to fubmit to the stricteft examination those vague complaints, thofe pretended wrongs, upon which the court of Verfailles has fo prudent ly avoided to explain itself, with that clearness and particularity which alone could fupport its reafons, and excufe its conduct. During a fifteen years peace, the interefts of two powerful and perhaps jealous nations, which ap

proached in fo many places in the old and new world, would inevitably furnish fubjects of complaint and difcuffion, which a reciprocal moderation would always know how to fettle, but which are but too eafily fharpened and impoifoned by the real hatred, or affected fufpicions, of a fecret and ambiti ous enemy: and the troubles of America were but too apt to mul tiply the hopes, the pretexts, and the unjuft pretenfions of France. Nevertheless, fuch has been the ever uniform and ever peaceable conduct of the King and his minifters, that it hath often filenced his enemies; and, if it may be permitted to difcover the true fenfe of these indefinite and equivocai accufations, whofe ftudied obfcurity betrays the features to fhame and artifice-if it may be permitted of contefted objects which have no existence, it may be affirmed with the boldness of truth, that feveral of thefe pretended injuries are announced for the first time, in a declaration of war, without having been proposed to the court of London, at a time when they might have been confidered with the ferious and favourable attention of friendship. In refpect to thofe complaints which the Ambaffadors of his Most Christian Majesty have communicated from time to time to the King's minifters, it would be eafy to give, or rather to repeat, fatisfactory anfwers, which would demonftrate, to the eyes of France herfelf, the King's moderation, his love of justice, and the fincerity of his difpofition to preferve the general tranquillity of Europe. Thofe complaints, which the court of Verfailles may difpenfe with recollecting, were very rarely

founded