in such uncommon numbers? To what end do
we procure strength, which we cannot exert, and exhaust the nation with
subsidies, at a time when nothing is disputed, which the princes, who
receive our subsidies, can defend? If we had purchased ships, and hired
seamen, we had apparently increased our power, and made ourselves
formidable to our enemies, and, if any increase of security be possible,
had secured ourselves still better from invasions: but what can the
regiments of Russia, or of Hesse, contribute to the defence of the
coasts of England; or, by what assistance can they repay us the sums,
which we have stipulated to pay for their costly friendship?

The king of Great Britain has, indeed, a territory on the continent, of
which the natives of this island scarcely knew the name, till the
present family was called to the throne, and yet know little more than
that our king visits it from time to time. Yet, for the defence of this
country, are these subsidies apparently paid, and these troops evidently
levied. The riches of our nation are sent into distant countries, and
the strength, which should be employed in our own quarrel, consequently
impaired, for the sake of dominions, the interest of which has no
connexion with ours, and which, by the act of succession, we took care
to keep separate from the British kingdoms.

To this the advocates for the subsidies say, that unreasonable
stipulations, whether in the act of settlement, or any other contract,
are, in themselves, void; and that if a country connected with England,
by subjection to the same sovereign, is endangered by an English
quarrel, it must be defended by English force; and that we do not engage
in a war, for the sake of Hanover, but that Hanover is, for our sake,
exposed to danger.

Those who brought in these foreign troops have still something further
to say in their defence, and of no honest plea is it our intention to
defraud them. They grant, that the terrour of invasion may, possibly, be
groundless; that the French may want the power, or the courage, to
attack us in our own country; but they maintain, likewise, that an
invasion is possible, that the armies of France are so numerous, that
she may hazard a large body on the ocean, without leaving herself
exposed; that she is exasperated to the utmost degree of acrimony, and
would be willing to do us mischief, at her own peril. They allow, that
the invaders may be intercepted at sea, or that, if they land