reaties or for the smaller nationalities except when she had
some ulterior and selfish purpose of her own to serve? I am quite ready
to meet that challenge, and to meet it in the only way in which it could
be met, by reference to history. And out of many illustrations which I
might take I will content myself here tonight with two, widely removed
in point of time, but both, as it happens, very apposite to the present
case.

I will go back first to the war carried on first against the
revolutionary Government of France and then against Napoleon, which
broke out in 1793, and which lasted for more than twenty years. We had
then at the head of the Government in this country one of the most
peace-loving Ministers who have ever presided over our fortunes--Mr.
Pitt. For three years, from 1789 to 1792, he resolutely refused to
interfere in any way with the revolutionary proceedings in France or in
the wars that sprang out of them, and as lately, I think, as February in
1792, in a memorable speech in the House of Commons, which shows among
other things the shortness of human foresight, he declared that there
never was a time when we in this country could more reasonably expect
fifteen years of peace.

And what was it, gentlemen, that, within a few months of that
declaration, led this pacific Minister to war? It was the invasion of
the treaty rights guaranteed by ourselves of a small European State, the
then States General of Holland. [Cheers.] For nearly 200 years the great
powers of Europe had guaranteed to Holland the exclusive navigation of
the River Scheldt. The French revolutionary Government invaded what is
now Belgium, and as a first act of hostility to Holland declared the
navigation of the Scheldt to be open. Our interest in that matter then,
as now, was relatively small and insignificant, but what was Mr. Pitt's
reply?

Defense of Small States.

I quote you the exact words he used in the House of Commons, they are so
applicable to the circumstances of the present moment. This is in 1793:

England will never consent that another country should arrogate the
power of annulling, at her pleasure, the political system of
Europe, established by solemn treaties and guaranteed by the
consent of the powers. [Cheers.]

He went on to say:

This House [the House of Commons] means substantial good faith to
its engagements. If it retains a just sense of the solemn faith of
treaties, it must