James's have no conception of.
They know no other influence than corruption and reckon all their
probabilities from precedent. A new case is to them a new world, and
while they are seeking for a parallel they get lost. The talents of
Lord Mansfield can be estimated at best no higher than those of a
sophist. He understands the subtleties but not the elegance of nature;
and by continually viewing mankind through the cold medium of the law,
never thinks of penetrating into the warmer region of the mind. As for
Lord North, it is his happiness to have in him more philosophy than
sentiment, for he bears flogging like a top, and sleeps the better for
it. His punishment becomes his support, for while he suffers the
lash for his sins, he keeps himself up by twirling about. In politics,
he is a good arithmetician, and in every thing else nothing at all.
There is one circumstance which comes so much within Lord North's
province as a financier, that I am surprised it should escape him,
which is, the different abilities of the two countries in supporting
the expense; for, strange as it may seem, England is not a match for
America in this particular. By a curious kind of revolution in
accounts, the people of England seem to mistake their poverty for
their riches; that is, they reckon their national debt as a part of
their national wealth. They make the same kind of error which a man
would do, who after mortgaging his estate, should add the money
borrowed, to the full value of the estate, in order to count up his
worth, and in this case he would conceive that he got rich by
running into debt.
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