stration_. I propose, first, that the present paymaster and the
treasurer of the navy should carry into the Exchequer the whole body of
the vouchers for what they have paid over to deputy-paymasters, to
regimental agents, or to any of those to whom they have and ought to
have paid money. I propose that those vouchers shall be admitted as
actual payments in their accounts, and that the persons to whom the
money has been paid shall then stand charged in the Exchequer in their
place. After this process, they shall be debited or charged for nothing
but the money-balance that remains in their hands.

I am conscious, Sir, that, if this balance (which they could not expect
to be so suddenly demanded by any usual process of the Exchequer) should
now be exacted all at once, not only their ruin, but a ruin of others to
an extent which I do not like to think of, but which I can well
conceive, and which you may well conceive, might be the consequence. I
told you, Sir, when I promised before the holidays to bring in this
plan, that I never would suffer any man or description of men to suffer
from errors that naturally have grown out of the abusive constitution of
those offices which I propose to regulate. If I cannot reform with
equity, I will not reform at all.

For the regulation of past accounts, I shall therefore propose such a
mode, as men, temperate and prudent, make use of in the management of
their private affairs, when their accounts are various, perplexed, and
of long standing. I would therefore, after their example, divide the
public debts into three sorts,--good, bad, and doubtful. In looking over
the public accounts, I should never dream of the blind mode of the
Exchequer, which regards things in the abstract, and knows no difference
in the quality of its debts or the circumstances of its debtors. By this
means it fatigues itself, it vexes others, it often crushes the poor, it
lets escape the rich, or, in a fit of mercy or carelessness, declines
all means of recovering its just demands. Content with the eternity of
its claims, it enjoys its Epicurean divinity with Epicurean languor. But
it is proper that all sorts of accounts should be closed some time or
other,--by payment, by composition, or by oblivion. _Expedit reipublicae
ut sit finis litium_. Constantly taking along with me, that an extreme
rigor is sure to arm everything against it, and at length to relax into
a supine neglect, I propose, Sir, that even the best,