This alone is a consideration of any
importance; because all calculation formed upon a supposed relation of
the habitudes of others to our own, under the present circumstances, is
weak and fallacious. The adversary must be judged, not by what we are,
or by what we wish him to be, but by what we must know he actually is:
unless we choose to shut our eyes and our ears to the uniform tenor of
all his discourses, and to his uniform course in all his actions. We may
be deluded; but we cannot pretend that we have been disappointed. The
old rule of _Ne te quaesiveris extra_ is a precept as available in policy
as it is in morals. Let us leave off speculating upon the disposition
and the wants of the enemy. Let us descend into our own bosoms; let us
ask ourselves what are our duties, and what are our means of discharging
them. In what heart are you at home? How far may an English minister
confide in the affections, in the confidence, in the force of an English
people? What does he find us, when he puts us to the proof of what
English interest and English honor demand? It is as furnishing an answer
to these questions that I consider the circumstances of the loan. The
effect on the enemy is not in what he may speculate on our resources,
but in what he shall feel from our arms.
The circumstances of the loan have proved beyond a doubt three capital
points, which, if they are properly used, may be advantageous to the
future liberty and happiness of mankind.
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