re about to pursue, but that every lord may reckon up the sum
required for the support of those troops. Let him take a view of our
military estimates, and he will quickly be convinced, how much we are
condemned to suffer in this cause. He will find, that we are about not
only to remit yearly into a foreign country more than a million and a
half of money, but to hazard the lives of multitudes of our
fellow-subjects, in a quarrel which at most affects us but remotely;
that we are about to incur as auxiliaries an expense greater than that
which the principals sustain.

The sum which I have mentioned, my lords, enormous as it may appear,
is by no means exaggerated beyond the truth. Whoever shall examine the
common military estimates, will easily be convinced, that the forces
which we now maintain upon the continent cannot be supported at less
expense; and that we are, therefore, about to exhaust our country in a
distant quarrel, and to lavish our blood and treasure with useless
profusion.

This profusion, my lords, is useless, at least useless to any other
end, than an ostentatious display of our forces, and our riches; not
because the balance of power is irrecoverably destroyed, not because
it is contrary to the natural interest of an island to engage in wars
on the continent, nor because we shall lose more by the diminution of
our commerce, than we shall gain by an annual victory. It is useless,
not because the power of France has by long negligence been suffered
to swell beyond all opposition, nor because the queen of Hungary ought
not to be assisted at the hazard of this kingdom, though all these
reasons are of importance enough to claim our consideration. It is
useless, my lords, because the queen of Hungary may be assisted more
powerfully, at less charge; because a third part of this sum will
enable her to raise, and to maintain, a greater body of men than have
now been sent her.

Nor will the troops which she may be thus enabled to raise, my lords,
be only more numerous, but more likely to prosecute the war with
ardour; and to conclude it, therefore, with success. They will fight
for the preservation of their own country, they will draw their swords
to defend their houses and their estates, their wives and their
children from the rage of tyrants and invaders; they will enter the
field as men who cannot leave it to their enemies, without resigning
all that makes life valuable; and who will, therefore, more willingl