s, including
an approbation of the means by which the war had been prosecuted. The
motion being seconded by Mr. Trevor, lord Noel Somerset stood up and
moved, that the house would in their address desire his majesty not
to engage these kingdoms in a war for the preservation of his foreign
dominions. He was supported by that incorruptible patriot Mr. Shippen,
who declared he was neither ashamed nor afraid to affirm that thirty
years had made no change in any of his political opinions. He said
he was grown old in the house of commons; that time had verified
the predictions he had formerly uttered; and that he had seen his
conjectures ripened into knowledge. "If my country," added he, "has been
so unfortunate as once more to commit her interest to men who propose to
themselves no advantage from their trust but that of selling it, I may,
perhaps, fall once more under censure for declaring my opinion, and be
once more treated as a criminal for asserting what they who punish me
cannot deny; for maintaining that Hanoverian maxims are inconsistent
with the happiness of this nation; and for preserving the caution so
strongly inculcated by those patriots who framed the Act of Settlement,
and conferred upon the present royal family their title to the throne."
He particularized the instances in which the ministry had acted in
diametrical opposition to that necessary constitution; and he insisted
on the necessity of taking some step to remove the apprehensions of the
people, who began to think themselves in danger of being sacrificed to
the security of foreign dominions. Mr. Gibbon, who spoke on the same
side of the question, expatiated upon the absurdity of returning thanks
for the prosecution of a war which had been egregiously mismanaged.
"What!" said he, "are our thanks to be solemnly returned for defeats,
disgrace, and losses, the ruin of our merchants, the imprisonment of
our sailors, idle shows of armaments, and useless expenses?" Sir Robert
Walpole having made a short speech in defence of the first motion for an
address, was answered by Mr. Pulteney, who seemed to be animated with
a double proportion of patriot indignation. He asserted, that from a
review of that minister's conduct since the beginning of the dispute
with Spain, it would appear that he had been guilty not only of single
errors, but of deliberate treachery; that he had always co-operated with
the enemies of his country, and sacrificed to his private interest the