ers; that their governours
should declare the motives of their measures, and discover the demands
of our allies, and the scheme of our policy; and that the people should
be consulted upon every emergence, and enjoy the right of instructing
not only their own representatives, but the ministers of the crown.

In this debate, the mention of secret treaties has been received with
contempt and ridicule; the ministers have been upbraided with chimerical
fears, and unnecessary provisions against attacks which never were
designed; they have been alleged to have no other interest in view than
their own, when they endeavour to mislead inquirers, and to have in
reality nothing to keep from publick view but their own ignorance or
wickedness.

It cannot surely be seriously asserted by men of knowledge and
experience, that there are no designs formed by wise governments, of
which the success depends upon secrecy; nor can it be asserted, that the
inquiry now proposed will betray nothing from which our enemies may
receive advantage.

If we should suppose, that all our schemes are either fully
accomplished, or irretrievably defeated, it will not even then be
prudent to discover them, since they will enable our enemies to form
conjectures of the future from the past, and to obviate, hereafter, the
same designs, when it shall be thought necessary to resume them.

But, in reality, nothing is more irrational than to suppose this a safer
time than any other for such general discoveries; for why should it be
imagined, that our engagements are not still depending, and our treaties
yet in force? And what can be more dishonourable or imprudent, than to
destroy at once the whole scheme of foreign policy, to dissolve our
alliances, and destroy the effects of such long and such expensive
negotiations, without first examining whether they will be beneficial or
detrimental to us?

Nor is it only with respect to foreign affairs that secrecy is
necessary; there are, undoubtedly, many domestick transactions which it
is not proper to communicate to the whole nation. There is still a
faction among us, which openly desires the subversion of our present
establishment; a faction, indeed, not powerful, and which grows, I hope,
every day weaker, but which is favoured, or at least imagines itself
favoured, by those who have so long distinguished themselves by opposing
the measures of the government. Against these men, whose hopes are
revived by every comm