For what can be urged to extenuate
the ridicule of returning thanks where we ought either to express
resentment, offer consolations, and propose the means of better success,
or cover our grief and shame with perpetual silence?
When it shall be told in foreign nations, that the senate of Britain had
returned thanks for the escape of the Spaniards from Ferrol, their
uninterrupted expedition to Italy, the embarrassment of their own trade,
the captivity of their sailors, and the destruction of their troops,
what can they conclude, but that the senate of Britain is a collection
of madmen, whom madmen have deputed to transact the publick affairs? And
what must be the influence of such a people, and such a senate, will be
easily conceived.
If I have given way, sir, in these observations, to any wanton
hyperbole, or exaggerated assertions, they will, I hope, be pardoned by
those who shall reflect upon the real absurdity of the proposal, which I
am endeavouring to show in its true state, and by all who shall
consider, that to return thanks for the management of the war, is to
return thanks for the carnage of Carthagena, for the ruin of our
merchants, for the loss of our reputation, and for the exaltation of the
family of Bourbon.
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