dices, the wifeft and most favourable difpofition of providence? Mr. Grattan, in afpeech the first in refpect of merit that was ever delivered in the Irish parliament, and which was thought by many to throw into fhade all that was most excellent in the art of eloquence that had appeared in the feat of empire, took an extenfive view of the whole range of the propofitions. He fet out with a comparifon between the free trade obtained in 1779, and what was now propofed. What the advantages might be that were likely to refult from the former, no man could fay; but any man, who had feen the struggle of Ireland during a century of depreffion, might forefee, that a fpirit of industry operating upon a state of liberty in a young nation must in a courfe of time produce fignal adyantages. The fea was like the earth, to non-exertion a waste, to industry a mine. By the fettlement of 1779, Ireland had recovered her right to trade with every part of the world whofe ports were open to her, fubject to her own unitipulated duties: the retained her right to trade directly to the British plantations in a variety of articles with out a reference to British duties; fhe added to this a privilege to trade with the British plantations directly in every other article fubject to the rate of british duty; the obtained the right to felect the articles, fo that the general trade fhould not hang on the fpecial conformity; and the did not covenant to affect, exclude or poftpone the produce of foreign plantations. Thus the fecured to herself the two great ob jects of the free trade, and the plantation trade. Thefe being fetled, a third in the opinion of fome remained, namely, the intercourfe with England or the Channel trade;

and the demand of protecting duties, that had been brought forward by a number of famifling manufacturers in the preceding year, the extent of whofe demand was idle, the manner of conveying it tumultuary, but the treatment it received. on the part of adminiftration temporifing and undecifive, paved the way for the introduction and difcuffion of this last branch of their commercial fituation.

The first branch of this object, as it was diftributed by Mr. Grattan, regarded the propofed equalifation of duties. This fyftem, fair in its principle, and in procefs of time likely to be beneficial, was not however pregnant with any great prefent advantage. Under this ar rangement the English manufacturer in reality continued protected, and the Irifli manufacturer expofed, and the abatement of duty was no more than difarming the argument of retaliation. But as Ireland was to covenant that he would not raise her duties on British manufactures, England on her part engaged that the would not diminish her prefer ence in favour of Irish linens. The adjustment however did not flop at the home manufacture; it extended to the barter of plantation produce. Here Ireland already food on the two grounds of law and justice. As to the law, Mr. Grattan could not conceive how the fame act of navigation could bear a different conftruction on the one fide of the Channel from what it bore on the other, unlets by fuppoling that in their ancient ftate of dependency they were not entitled to the common benefit of the mother tongue. And as to justice, fince it was cleary on their fide, they were as yet a free parliament, and if they did not find the law equal, they might make it fo.

Mr.

Mr. Grattan was much more copious upon the fecond divifion of his fubject, which bore upon its face inequality of duty as well as inequality of trade. This related in the first place to the raw material of the woollen manufacture. The propofition indeed, ftipulated that there fhould be no new prohibition. But every prohibition beneficial to England was laid before, and none in favour of Ireland. Ireland till 1779 was a province; and, before the provincial regulations were fuperfeded, this arrangement eft blished a principle of uti poffidetis, that is, Great Britain fhould retais all her advantages, and Ireland all her difadvantages. But there were inftances of more ftriking inequali. ty; they were to give a monopoly to the prefent or any future Eait India company during its existence, and to the British nation for ever after. This was not a furrender of the political rights of the conftitu. tion, but of the natural prerogatives of man; not of the privileges of parliament, but of the rights of nations. They were not to fail beyond the cape of Good Hope, and the traits of Magellan. An awful interdict! Other interdicts extended to a determined period of time; but here was an eternity of restraint! Other interdicts extended to particular places for local reafons; but here were neutral regions forbid. dep, and the bounties of providence denied in the moft opulent boundaries of creation! It refembled ather a judgment of God than an act of the legiflature, whether they measured it by immenfity of fp.ce, or infinity of duration, and had nothing human about it except its prefumption!

From their fituation in the East Mr. Grattan proceeded to confider their fituation in the West. They

were to give a monopoly to the British plantations at their own taxes. Hitherto they only did fo in certain articles, with a power of felection, and that only as long as they pleafed to conform to the condition and without any ftipulation to exclude foreign produce. Now they were to covenant to do fo for ever, and thus to put the trade for ever out of their own difcretion. Mr. Grattan afked, why did they refufe protecting duties to their countrymen? Because they looked like a monopoly. And would they give to the Eaft India merchant, and to the West India planter, fomething more; a monopoly,where the monopolift was the lawgiver? The principle of equal duties and equal restrictions was not the fhadow of a fecurity, because the condition of the two countries was totally dif fimilar. Suppofe Great Britain, to answer the exigency of fome future war, er to fund her prefent debt, fhould raife her colony duties still higher, Ireland must follow, not becaufe fhe wanted the tax, but left her exemption from taxes fhould give her manufactures any comparative advantage. Irish taxes were to be precautions against the profperity of Irish manufactures. He feared, that by adopting the propofitions they would introduce fomething worse than this; they would make English jealoufy the barometer of Irith taxes. The exclufion of foreign plantation produce would have fecmed fufficient for every purpose of power and domination; but to aggravate, and it should feem to infult them, the independent states of America were most ungracioufly brought into the arrangement, as if Ireland were a British colony, or North America continued a part of the British dominions,

But

But without enlarging upon this circumstance Mr. Grattan called the attention of his hearers to one article in the settlement, which could accompany no fettlement, which must be fatal to any treaty, and tear afunder the bands of faith and affection. The article he intended was that which opened afresh the fettlement of the free trade, and the colony trade in 1779. The prefent fyftem took from them the power of felection, so that the whole covenant hanged on each feveral branch; and took from them their option of the produce of foreign plantations, and of America. It was a revifion in peace of the fettlements of war; it was a revocation in peace of the acquifition of war. Mr. Grattan conceived those arrangements to be facred. They might make other arrangements with the British nation, but they would never make any fo beneficial as these. They were the refult of a conjuncture, miraculoutly formed, and fortunately feized. From the confideration of these fettlements he was naturally led to that part of the fubject which related to compenfation. Compenfation certainly could not apply to the free trade of 1779, or the free conflitution of 1782, first because they were already adjusted, and could not be revoked; and secondly, because they were points of unalienable right. Freemen would not pay for the recovery of their rights; payment derogated from the nature of the claim, and fo it had then been understood. It was then thought, that to have annexed fubfidy to conftitution would have marred an illustrious experiment on the feelings of the nation. Then was exhibited the bolder policy, the happy art, which faw how much might be got by compulfion, and how much might be

left to honour; which yielded them their claims unftipulated and unconditioned, and made a bold push for the hearts of the nation. Let them fee then what they obtained without compenfation. A colony trade, a free trade, the independency of their judges, the government of the army, the extinction of the unconftitutional powers of the council, the restoration of the judicature of their lords, and the independency of their legislature. Let them fee now what they obtained by compenfation; a covenant not to trade beyond the Cape of Good Hope and the Straits of Magellan; a covenant not to take foreign plantation produce, not to take American produce, but as Great Britain fhould permit; a covenant not to take British plantation produce but as Great Britain should prefcribe; a covenant never to protect their own manufactures, never to guard the primum of those manufactures; thefe things accempanied, he acknowledged, with a covenant on the part of England to difarm the argument for protecting duties, to give the English lan guage in the act of navigation the fame conftruction in both countries, and to leave the linen market without moleftation. One would think fome God prefided over the liberties of that country, who made it frugality in the Irish nation to continue free, and annexed the penalties of fine as well as infamy to the furrender of the conftitution!

From the confideration of commerce Mr. Grattan proceeded to a question much more high and inef timable, before which the ideas of protecting duties, of reciprocal duties, of countervailing duties, va nifhed into nothing, and by the tendencies of which the prudence of every head and the energies of every

heart

heart were called forth to fhield the new acquired rights of a nation, fo long depreffed, fo recently by the conjunctures of foreign affairs and by domeftic virtue emancipated. If three years after the recovery of their freedom they could be brought to bead, their children, corrupted by their example, would furrender; but if they ftood firm and inexorable, they would make a feafonable impreffion on the people of England; they would give a whole fonie example to their children; and, as the old English did in the cafe of their charter, they would render the prefent attempt on Irifh liberty its beit and perpetual confirmation. Mr. Grattan acknowledged that by their external power they might difcompofe the harmony of empire; and he added, that by their power over the purfe they might diffolve the ftate. But this was to reft the connection upon a new and a falfe principle. If any body of men could ftill think that the Irish conftitution was incompatible with the British empire, a doctrine which he abjured as fedition against both, he would antwer, Perifh the empire, Live the confiitution! He fpoke, however, as if a transfer of legiflative authority could poffibly be made; but in fact it was impoffible. Man was not omnipotent over himfelf, neither were parliaments omnipotent to accomplish their own deftruétion, and propagate death to their fucceflors. There was in thefe cafes a fuperior relationship to their refpective creators, God and the community, which in the inftance of the individual arrefted the hand of. fuicide, and in that of the political body flopped the act of furaender, and made man the means of propagation, and parliament the organ to continue liberty, not the engine to deftroy it. They, the

limited truftees of delegated power, born for a particular purpofe, confined to a particular time, and bearing an inviolable relationship to the people who fent them to parliament, could not break that relationship, counteract that purpofe, and furrender, diminish or derogate from thofe privileges they lived but to preferve. Mr. Grattan congratulated that houfe, that it was one of the bleilings of the British conftitution, that it could not die of a rapid mortality, or perifh like the men that fhould protect her. Any act, that would defroy the liberty of the people, was dead-born from the womb. They might put down the public caufe for a feafon, but another year would fee old conftitution advance the honours of his head, and the good inftitution of parliament, fhaking off the prifon of the tomb, to reafcend in all its pomp and pride and plenitude of privilege!

Mr. Grattan had stated thefe propofitions, as a mere transfer of external legiflative authority to the parlament of Great Britain; but he had understated their mifchief, fince they included in reality a power of unlimited taxation. If a minister should turn himself to a general excife, if he fhould wish to relieve from the weight of further additional duties, the hereditary revenue already alienated, if he fhould defire to gratify the alarms of the English ma nufacturers, who complained of the exemption of Ireland from excifes, particularly on fuch articles as foap, candles and leather; he might tax her by threats, fuggefling that, if the refufed to raife an excife on herfelf, England would raile colony duties on both. See what a mighty infrument of coercion might be made of this bill and thefe refolutions! Stir, and Great Britain could cruft them. Stir, and the minifter