We were a people
unknown, and unconnected with the political world, and strangers to
the disposition of foreign powers. Could you possibly wish for a
more favorable conjunction of circumstances? Yet all these have
happened and passed away, and, as it were, left you with a laugh.
There are likewise, events of such an original nativity as can never
happen again, unless a new world should arise from the ocean.
If any thing can be a lesson to presumption, surely the
circumstances of this war will have their effect. Had Britain been
defeated by any European power, her pride would have drawn consolation
from the importance of her conquerors; but in the present case, she is
excelled by those that she affected to despise, and her own opinions
retorting upon herself, become an aggravation of her disgrace.
Misfortune and experience are lost upon mankind, when they produce
neither reflection nor reformation. Evils, like poisons, have their
uses, and there are diseases which no other remedy can reach. It has
been the crime and folly of England to suppose herself invincible, and
that, without acknowledging or perceiving that a full third of her
strength was drawn from the country she is now at war with. The arm of
Britain has been spoken of as the arm of the Almighty, and she has
lived of late as if she thought the whole world created for her
diversion. Her politics, instead of civilizing, has tended to
brutalize mankind, and under the vain, unmeaning title of "Defender of
the Faith," she has made war like an Indian against the religion of
humanity.
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