to the best of my power, unimpaired and
undiminished, the just, wise, and necessary constitutional superiority
of Great Britain. This is necessary for America as well as for us. I
never mean to depart from it. Whatever may be lost by it, I avow it. The
forfeiture even of your favor, if by such a declaration I could forfeit
it, though the first object of my ambition, never will make me disguise
my sentiments on this subject.

But--I have ever had a clear opinion, and have ever held a constant
correspondent conduct, that this superiority is consistent with all the
liberties a sober and spirited American ought to desire. I never mean to
put any colonist, or any human creature, in a situation not becoming a
free man. To reconcile British superiority with American liberty shall
be my great object, as far as my little faculties extend. I am far from
thinking that both, even yet, may not be preserved.

When I first devoted myself to the public service, I considered how I
should render myself fit for it; and this I did by endeavoring to
discover what it was that gave this country the rank it holds in the
world. I found that our prosperity and dignity arose principally, if not
solely, from two sources: our Constitution, and commerce. Both these I
have spared no study to understand, and no endeavor to support.

The distinguishing part of our Constitution is its liberty. To preserve
that liberty inviolate seems the particular duty and proper trust of a
member of the House of Commons. But the liberty, the only liberty, I
mean is a liberty connected with order: that not only exists along with
order and virtue, but which cannot exist at all without them. It inheres
in good and steady government, as in its substance and vital principle.

The other source of our power is commerce, of which you are so large a
part, and which cannot exist, no more than your liberty, without a
connection with many virtues. It has ever been a very particular and a
very favorite object of my study, in its principles, and in its details.
I think many here are acquainted with the truth of what I say. This I
know,--that I have ever had my house open, and my poor services ready,
for traders and manufacturers of every denomination. My favorite
ambition is, to have those services acknowledged. I now appear before
you to make trial, whether my earnest endeavors have been so wholly
oppressed by the weakness of my abilities as to be rendered
insignificant in the