as been shown, that the general scheme of policy uniformly pursued
by our ancestors in every period of time, since the increase of the
French greatness, has been to preserve an equipoise of power, by which
all the smaller states are preserved in security. It is apparent, that
by this scheme alone can the happiness of mankind be preserved, and
that no other family but that of Austria is able to balance the house
of Bourbon.

This equipoise of power has by some lords been imagined an airy
scheme, a pleasing speculation which, however it may amuse the
imagination, can never be reduced to practice. It has been asserted,
that the state of nations is always variable, that dominion is every
day transferred by ambition or by casualties, that inheritances fall
by want of heirs into other hands, and that kingdoms are by one
accident divided at one time, and at other times consolidated by a
different event; that to be the guardians of all those whose credulity
or folly may betray them to concur with the ambition of an artful
neighbour, and to promote the oppression of themselves, is an endless
task; and that to obviate all the accidents by which provinces may
change their masters, is an undertaking to which no human foresight is
equal; that we have not a right to hinder the course of succession for
our own interest, nor to obstruct those contracts which independent
princes are persuaded to make, however contrary to their own interest,
or to the general advantage of mankind. And it has been concluded by
those reasoners, that we should show the highest degree of wisdom, and
the truest, though not the most refined policy, by attending steadily
to our own interest, by improving the dissensions of our neighbours to
our own advantage, by extending our commerce, and increasing our
riches, without any regard to the happiness or misery, freedom or
slavery of the rest of mankind.

I believe I need not very laboriously collect arguments to prove to
your lordships that this scheme of selfish negligence, of supine
tranquillity, is equally imprudent and ungenerous; since, if we
examine the history of the last century, we shall easily discover,
that if this nation had not interposed, the French had now been
masters of more than half Europe; and it cannot be imagined that they
would have suffered us to set them at defiance in the midst of their
greatness, that they would have spared us out of tenderness, or
forborne to attack us out of fear. Wh