o divide power so
equally, that no party may have any certain prospect of advantage by
making war upon another.

For this reason, my lords, it was apparently contrary to our interest
to grant those provinces to those to whom, by their situation, they
might have been most useful. Such countries, and such manufactures in
the hands of a people versed, perhaps, beyond all others, both in the
science and the stratagems of trade, and always watchful to improve
every opportunity of increasing their riches, would have enabled them
in a short time to purchase an interest in the councils of all the
monarchs of the world, to have maintained fleets that might have
covered the ocean, and to have obtained that universal dominion to
which the French have so long aspired, and which it is, perhaps, more
for the interest of mankind, that if slavery cannot be prevented, they
should obtain, as they would, perhaps, use their power with more
generosity.

The same reason, my lords, naturally made the Dutch unwilling to put
these provinces in the hands of Britain; for we, likewise, make a
profession of trade, though we do not pursue it with the same ardour,
or, to confess the truth, with the same success: it was not, however,
to be imagined, that there would not be found among us some men of
sagacity to discern, and of industry to improve the opportunities
which the new dominions would have put into our hands of vending our
manufactures in parts where, at present, they are very little known.
Nor was this the only danger to be feared from such an increase of
dominion: the Dutch have not yet forgotten, that though we at first
rescued them from slavery, patronised the infancy of their state, and
continued our guardianship till it was grown up to maturity, and
enabled to support itself by its own strength, yet we afterwards made
very vigorous attempts to reduce it to its original weakness, and to
sink it into pupillage again; that we attempted to invade the most
essential part of its rights, and to prescribe the number of ships
that it should maintain. They know, likewise, my lords, that by the
natural rotation of human affairs, the same counsels may in some
future reign be again pursued, or that some unavoidable conflict of
interest may produce a contest that can be decided only by the sword;
and then it may easily be perceived how much they would be endangered,
by the neighbourhood of British garrisons, and of countries, where we
might mainta