threatened by it, have been asserted in very strong
terms, but I think not proved with proportionate force; for we have
heard no regular deduction of consequences by which this danger might
be shown, nor have been informed, how the engagement of sixteen
thousand Hanoverians to serve us against France for the ensuing year,
can be considered as more destructive to our liberties than any other
forces.

It is, indeed, insinuated, that this conduct will furnish a dangerous
precedent of preference granted to Hanover above other nations; and
that this preference may gradually be advanced, till in time Hanover
may, by a servile ministry, be preferred to Britain itself, and that,
therefore, all such partiality ought to be crushed in the beginning,
and its authors pursued with indignation and abhorrence.

That to prefer the interest of Hanover to that of Britain would be in
a very high degree criminal in a British ministry, I believe no man in
this house will go about to deny; but if no better proof can be
produced, that such preference is intended than the contract which we
are now desired to ratify, it may be with reason hoped, that such
atrocious treachery is yet at a great distance; for how does the hire
of Hanoverian troops show any preference of Hanover to Britain?

The troops of Hanover are not hired by the ministry as braver or more
skilful than those of our own country; they are not hired to command
or to instruct, but to assist us; nor can I discover, supposing it
possible to have raised with equal expedition the same number of
forces in our own country, how the ministry can be charged with
preferring the Hanoverians by exposing them to danger and fatigue.

But if it be confessed, that such numbers would not possibly be
raised, or, at least, not possibly disciplined with the expedition
that the queen of Hungary required, it will be found, that the
Hanoverians were at most not preferred to our own nation, but to other
foreigners, and for such preference reasons have been already given
which I shall esteem conclusive, till I hear them confuted.

The other objection on which the honourable gentleman thought it
proper to insist, was the neglect of demanding from the senate a
previous approbation of the contract which is now before us; a
neglect, in his opinion, so criminal, that the ministry cannot be
acquitted of arbitrary government, of squandering the publick money by
their own caprice, and of assuming to themselves