s will
require more money to raise and to pay them, and more money can only be
obtained by new taxes; but what now remains to be taxed, or what tax can
be increased? The only resource left us is a lottery, and whether that
will succeed is likewise a lottery; but though folly and credulity
should once more operate according to our wishes, the nation is, in the
meantime, impoverished, and at last lotteries must certainly fail, like
other expedients. When the publick wealth is entirely exhausted,
artifice and violence will be equally vain. And though the troops may
possibly be raised, according to the estimate, I know not how we shall
pay them, or from what fund, yet unmortgaged, the officers who will be
entailed upon us, can hope to receive their half-pay.

For my part, sir, I think the question so easy to be decided, that I am
astonished to see it the subject of a debate, and imagine that the
controversy might be ended only by asking the gentleman, on whose
opinion all his party appear to rely, without any knowledge or
conviction of their own, whether, if he were to defend a nation from its
enemies, and could procure only a small sum for the war, he would not
model his forces by the cheapest method.

Mr. SLOPER then spoke thus:--Sir, I cannot, without the highest
satisfaction, observe any advances made in useful knowledge, by my
fellow-subjects, as the glory of such attainments must add to the
reputation of the kingdom which gives rise to such elevated abilities.

This satisfaction I have received from the observations of the right
honourable member, whose accurate computations cannot but promise great
improvements of the doctrine of arithmetick; nor can I forbear to
solicit him, for the sake of the publick, to take into his consideration
the present methods of traffick used by our merchants, and to strike out
some more commodious method of stating the accoinpts between those two
contending parties, debtor and creditor. This he would, doubtless,
execute with great reputation, who has proved, from the state of our
taxes, that new forces require new funds, and that new funds cannot be
established without a lottery.

I am, indeed, inclined to differ from him in the last of his positions,
and believe the nation not yet so much exhausted but that it may easily
bear the expense of the war, and shall, therefore, vote for that
establishment of our troops which will be most likely to procure
success, without the least apprehe