Samuel Johnson - The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D. Volume 11

Of this conduct we have had already an instance in the present debate; a debate managed with such vigour, order, and resolution, as sufficiently shows the advantage of regular discipline long continued, and proves, that troops may retain their skill and spirit, even when they are deprived of that leader, to whose instructions and example they were indebted for them. When first this motion was offered, it seems to have been their chief hope to divert us from it by outcries of impossibility, by representing it as the demand of men unacquainted with the state of our offices, or the multiplicity of transactions, in which the indefatigable industry of our ministers has been employed; and they have therefore endeavoured to persuade us, that they are only discouraging us from an insuperable labour, and advising us to desist from measures which we cannot live to accomplish.

But when they found, sir, that their exaggerations produced merriment instead of terrour, that their opponents were determined to try their strength against impossibility, that they were resolved to launch out into this boundless ocean of inquiry; an ocean of which they have been boldly told, that it has neither shore nor bottom, and that whoever ventures into it must be tost about for life; when they discovered that this was not able to shake our resolution, or move us to any other disposition, they thought it proper to explain away their assertion of impossibility, by making a kind of distinction between things impossible, and things which cannot be performed; and finding it necessary to enlarge their plea, they have now asserted, that this inquiry is both impossible and inexpedient.

Its impossibility, sir, has been already sufficiently discussed, and shown to mean only a difficulty which the unskilfulness of our ministers has produced; for transactions can only produce difficulties to the inquirer, when they are confused; and confusion can only be the effect of ignorance or neglect.

Artifice is, indeed, one more source of perplexity: it is the interest of that man whose cause is bad to speak unintelligibly in the defence of it, and of him whose actions cannot bear to be examined, to hide them in disorder, to engage his pursuers in a labyrinth, that they may not trace his steps and discover his retreat; and what intricacies may be produced by fraud cooperating with subtilty, it is not possible to tell.

I do not, however, believe, that all the art of wickedness can elude the inquiries of a British senate, quickened by zeal for the publick happiness. The sagacity of our predecessors has often detected crimes concealed with more policy than can be ascribed to those whose conduct is now to be examined, and dragged the authors of national calamities to punishment from their darkest retreats. The expediency, therefore, of this motion, is now to be considered, and surely it will not require long reflection to prove that it is proper, when the nation is oppressed with calamities, to inquire by what misconduct they were brought upon it; when immense sums have been raised by the most oppressive methods of exaction, to ask why they were demanded, and how they were expended; when penal laws have been partially executed, to examine by what authority they were suspended, and by what they were enforced; and when the senate has for twenty years implicitly obeyed the direction of one man, when it has been known throughout the nation, before any question was proposed, how it would be decided, to search out the motive of that regular compliance, and to examine whether the minister was reverenced for his wisdom and virtue, or feared for his power, or courted for the publick money; whether he owed his prevalence to the confidence or corruption of his followers?

It cannot surely be thought inexpedient, to inquire into the reasons for which our merchants were for many years suffered to be plundered, or for which a war, solicited by the general voice of the whole nation, was delayed; into the reasons for which our fleets were fitted out only to coast upon the ocean, and connive at the departure of squadrons and the transportation of armies, to suffer our allies to be invaded, and our traders ruined and enslaved.

It is, in my opinion, convenient to examine with the utmost rigour, why time was granted to our enemies to fortify themselves against us, while a standing army preyed upon our people? Why forces unacquainted with the use of arms were sent against them, under the command of leaders equally ignorant? And why we have suffered their privateers in the mean time to rove at large over the ocean, and insult us upon our own coasts? Why we did not rescue our sailors from captivity, when opportunities of exchange were in our power? And why we robbed our merchants of their crews by rigorous impresses, without employing them either to guard our trade, or subdue our enemies?

If the senate is not to be suffered to inquire into affairs like these, it is no longer any security to the people, that they have the right of electing representatives; and unless they may carry their inquiries back as far as they shall think it necessary, the most acute sagacity may be easily eluded; causes may be very remote from their consequences, the original motives of a long train of wicked measures may lie hid in some private transaction of former years, and those advantages which our enemies have been of late suffered to obtain, were perhaps sold them at some forgotten congress by some secret article.

Such are, probably, the private transactions which the honourable gentleman is so much afraid of exposing to the light; transactions in which the interest of this nation has been meanly yielded up by cowardice, or sold by treachery; in which Britain has been considered as a province subordinate to some other country, or in which the minister has enriched himself by the sacrifice of the publick rights.

It has been, indeed, alleged with some degree of candour, that many of our treaties were provisions against invasions which perhaps were never intended, and calculated to defeat measures which only our own cowardice disposed us to fear. That such treaties have, indeed, been made, Hanover is a sufficient witness; but however frequently they may occur, they may surely be discovered with very little disadvantage to the nation; they will prove only the weakness of those that made them, who were at one time intimidated by chimerical terrours, and at another, lulled into confidence by airy security.

The concessions from foreign powers, which have been likewise mentioned, ought surely not to be produced as arguments against the motion; for what could more excite the curiosity of the nation, if, indeed, this motion were in reality produced by malevolence or resentment; if none were expected to concur in it but those who envied the abilities, or had felt the power of the late minister, it might be, perhaps, defeated by such insinuations; for nothing could more certainly regain his reputation, or exalt him to more absolute authority, than proofs that he had obtained for us any concessions from foreign powers.

If any advantageous terms have been granted us, he must be confessed to have so far discharged his trust to his allies, that he has kept them with the utmost caution from the knowledge of the people, who have heard, during all his administration, of nothing but subsidies, submission, and compliances paid to almost every prince on the continent who has had the confidence to demand them; and if by this inquiry any discovery to the disadvantage of our allies should be struck out, he may with great sincerity allege, that it was made without his consent.

Another objection to this inquiry is, that the spies which are retained in foreign courts may be detected by it, that the canals of our intelligence will be for ever stopped, and that we shall henceforth have no knowledge of the designs of foreign powers, but what may be honestly attained by penetration and experience. Spies are, indeed, a generation for whose security I have not much regard, but for whom I am on this occasion less solicitous, as I believe very few of them will be affected by this motion.