ved on this occasion, that a single year of neglect
may never be retrieved. We may, sir, now be able to support those whom,
when once dispossessed, it will not be in our power to restore; and that
if we suffer the house of Austria to be overborne, our posterity,
through every generation, may have reason to curse our injudicious
parsimony, our fatal inactivity, and our perfidious cowardice.

With what views the king of Prussia concurs in the French measures, or
upon what principles of policy he promises to himself any security in
the enjoyment of his new dominions, it is not easy to conjecture; but as
it is easy to discover, that whatever he may propose to himself, his
conduct evidently tends to the ruin of Europe, so he may, in my opinion,
justly be opposed, if he cannot be diverted or made easy.

Nor can we, sir, if this opposition should incite him, or any other
power, to an invasion of his majesty's foreign dominions, refuse them
our protection and assistance: for as they suffer for the cause which we
are engaged to support, and suffer only by our measures, we are at
least, as allies, obliged by the laws of equity and the general compacts
of mankind, to arm in their defence; and what may be claimed by the
common right of allies, we shall surely not deny them, only because they
are more closely united to us, because they own the same monarch with
ourselves.

Mr. PULTENEY spoke to the following purpose:--Sir, with what eagerness
the French snatch every opportunity of increasing their influence,
extending their dominions, and oppressing their neighbours, the
experience of many years has convinced all Europe; and it is evident
that unless some power be preserved in a degree of strength nearly equal
to theirs, their schemes, pernicious as they are, cannot be defeated.

That the only power from which this opposition can be hoped, is the
house of Austria, a very superficial view of this part of the globe,
will sufficiently demonstrate; of this we were long since so strongly
convinced, that we employed all our forces and all our politicks to
aggrandize this house. We endeavoured not only to support it in all its
hereditary rights, but to invest it with new sovereignties, and extend
its authority over new dominions.

Why we afterwards varied in our councils and our measures, I have long
inquired without any satisfaction, having never, sir, with the utmost
application, been able to discover the motives to the memorable tre