ed to Fox, and expressed great indignation at the insinuation, that
ministers were in the pay of France. There was no man in the kingdom, he
said, that would believe such a monstrous absurdity; and he vindicated
their zeal in the service of their country, and ascribed any errors that
had been committed to the head rather than to the heart. The American
war, he continued, was prosecuted, not with the design of aggrandising
the crown at the expense of the constitution, but of preserving,
unbroken, that venerable fabric for which our forefathers had bled, and
which all Europe envied. He then reminded the house, that the quarrel
had been begun by parliament, and not by the king--not under the present
ministry, but by that formed out of the ranks of the members of the
existing opposition. A disaster had occurred in Virginia, but were we,
he asked, on that account to lie down and die? For his own part, he
thought, that it should rather animate us to increased exertions: by
dejection and despair everything might be lost. As for himself, he
declared, that he would not be deterred by menaces of impeachment from
striving to preserve the rights and legislative authority of parliament.
The war had been unfortunate, but not unjust: it was founded in right,
and dictated by necessity. He had always thought so, he added, and
if the share he had taken in it should bring him to the scaffold, his
opinions would remain unaltered. Burke replied to the premier in a
speech of great power. North's speech, he said, was not only imprudent
but audacious. "The war," he "continued, was not unfortunate, but
disgraceful; for the former epithet could only apply to occurrences in
which fortune alone was concerned, whereas the present war exhibited
neither plan nor foresight. Victory and defeat, in this case, were each
equally calamitous, for each instigated us to go on; but the
king's speech was the greatest of all calamities, for it showed the
determination of ministers to consummate our ruin." Burke spoke largely
on the "rights" for which it was said that the war was begun, and for
which it was continued. He asked, whether we ought to risk everything,
and think of no consequences for the sake of a right? Whether ministers
did not know that right without might was of little worth? and whether
a claim, without the power of enforcing it, was not nugatory in the
copyhold of rival states? He compared the reasonings of ministers to a
man, who, full of his pr