dearer in effect: because fewer will be in a condition to buy. Thus your
apparent plenty will be real indigence. At present, even under temporary
disadvantages, the use of flesh is greater here than anywhere else; it
is continued without any interruption of Lents or meagre days; it is
sustained and growing even with the increase of our taxes. But some have
the art of converting even the signs of national prosperity into
symptoms of decay and ruin. And our author, who so loudly disclaims
popularity, never fails to lay hold of the most vulgar popular
prejudices and humors, in hopes to captivate the crowd. Even those
peevish dispositions which grow out of some transitory suffering, those
passing clouds which float in our changeable atmosphere, are by him
industriously figured into frightful shapes, in order first to terrify,
and then to govern the populace.

It was not enough for the author's purpose to give this false and
discouraging picture of the state of his own country. It did not fully
answer his end, to exaggerate her burdens, to depreciate her successes,
and to vilify her character. Nothing had been done, unless the
situation of France were exalted in proportion as that of England had
been abased. The reader will excuse the citation I make at length from
his book; he outdoes himself upon this occasion. His confidence is
indeed unparalleled, and altogether of the heroic cast:--

"If our rival nations were in the same circumstances with ourselves, the
_augmentation of our taxes would produce no ill consequences_: if we
were obliged to raise our prices, they must, from the same causes, do
the like, and could take no advantage by underselling and under-working
us. But the alarming consideration to Great Britain is, _that France is
not in the same condition_. Her distresses, during the war, were great,
but they were immediate; her want of credit, as has been said, compelled
her to impoverish her people, by raising the greatest part of her
supplies within the year; _but the burdens she imposed on them were, in
a great measure, temporary, and must be greatly diminished by a few
years of peace_. She could procure no considerable loans, therefore she
has mortgaged no _such oppressive taxes as those Great Britain has
imposed in perpetuity for payment of interest_. Peace must, therefore,
soon re-establish her commerce and manufactures, especially as the
comparative _lightness of taxes_, and the cheapness of living, in that