ineffectual, if we engage in them, not
with an intention to perplex, but to inform each other. I am of opinion,
sir, that the importance of the question requires a committee; nor can I
discover any essential defect in the bill, which should hinder it from
passing into a law.

Mr. BURRELL spoke to this effect:--Sir, I am convinced by experience, as
well as reason, that so many inconveniencies arise from this method of
insurance, that it affords so many opportunities of fraud, and gives
such encouragement to negligence, that I shall willingly concur in any
measures that may effectually suppress it.

It is, sir, too well known to require proof, that interest is the parent
of diligence, and that men attend to the performance of their duty, in
proportion as they must suffer by the neglect of it; and, therefore,
every practice that deprives honesty of its reward is injurious to the
publick.

But that this is the consequence of estimating ships at an imaginary
value in the offices of insurance, is, to the highest degree, evident.
When a ship is estimated above its real value, how will the commander
suffer by a wreck, or what shall restrain him from destroying his
vessel, when it may be done with security to himself, except that
integrity, which, indeed, ought to be generally diffused, but which is
not always to be found, and to which few men think it safe to trust upon
occasions of far less importance.

To show, sir, that I do not indulge groundless suspicions, or magnify
the bare possibility of fraud into reality; that I do not blacken human
nature, or propose laws against wickedness that has not yet existed; it
may be proper to mention some letters, in which I have been informed, by
my correspondent at Leghorn, of the state of the ships which have
arrived there; ships so weakly manned, and so penuriously or negligently
stored, so much decayed in the bottoms, and so ill fitted with rigging,
that he declares his astonishment at their arrival.

It may deserve our consideration, sir, whether the success of the
Spanish privateers may not be, in great part, attributed to this
pernicious practice; whether captains, when their vessels are insured
for more than their value, do not rashly venture into known danger?
whether they do not wilfully miss the security of convoys? whether they
do not direct their courses where privateers may most securely cruise?
whether they do not surrender with less resistance than interest would
ex