which might be entertained of the situation of the country, that it was a task extremely painful to raise any dispute, or even to insinuate any doubts which might tend to remove the grateful delusion. Upon an occasion like this, however, it was impossible to be silent; and, therefore, he should think himself warranted in making a trespass upon the attention of the house. Certain propositions had been made by the chancellor of the exchequer in the course of his speech, and it would be very easy for him to lay down other propositions which would entirely contradict them; but this would be going upon grounds too loose for the house to form any judgment of the merits of their several affirmations, which could only be established by a reference to authentic documents. To these he was willing to refer himself; and it would be a test of sincerity in the chancellor of the exchequer, much to be wished for, if he would submit himself to the same trial, and would not oppose any motion which he should make for the production of such papers as would affirm or disaffirm, by an irresistible authority, what they could severally advance in opposition to each other. Superficial and slight indeed was the manner in which the right honourable gentleman (Mr. Pitt) had condescended to justify the loan he had proposed. He had said little or nothing about what the house had a right to expect to be more particularly informed of; and he had scarcely shown a cause of any kind, much less a sufficient cause, why the nation should be reduced to the unexampled dilemma in time of peace, and amidst all the triumph which they had been used to on the part of the right honourable gentleman, in respect to the flourishing situation of our finances, of increasing the national debt, of creating fresh funds, and levying fresh taxes. But the right honourable gentleman had not withheld every kind of information; he had descended to little particulars, and had been very elaborate and ingenious in explaining the nature of the loan, and in telling them of things which it was of very slight importance whether they were or were not as he represented them. Where the argument of the right honourable gentleman was not in its nature unimportant it was fallacious. Admitting that the revenue was likely to come up to what it had been asserted that it would reach to (and even this required some concession), was it reasonably to be expected that the expenditure was not to exceed what it had been stated it would be? If the expenditure should exceed what it was

stated at (and experience had demonstrated that it would exceed that sum), it was a plain case that we were deceived in our expectations, and that our finances were not in the condition they were represented to be. The right honourable gentleman had given us a very pompous account of the unforeseen contingencies of expense which had happened, by which means he had failed in the promises he had made. These unforeseen contingencies, however, upon the fullest statement which could be made of them, amounted only to £600,000; but £600,000 divided among three years, which is the time from which the reduction of the national debt was to be computed, left only an excess of £200,000 for each year of unforeseen expenditure, beyond the natural expenditure which was necessarily to be expected. So paltry an increase as this was to defeat and annul all the high-sounding promises of the right honourable gentleman, and to reduce us to the necessity which we now find ourselves in, of creating fresh debts, instead of paying off those which had been already created in the course of a long and expensive war. In like manner as this £600,000 had arisen during the last three years from unforeseen contingencies, so from the analogy of the thing it was to be presumed that another £600,000 from unforeseen contingencies would arise in the time to come; and in the same manner as we have been prevented hitherto from emerging from our unhappy situation, by the unforeseen contingencies which have already arisen, so in time to come we shall be continued in the same depression of circumstances from the unforeseen contingencies which will yet arise, more particularly since the sum is so trifling which is to embarrass us. The right honourable gentleman had amused us, by informing us that we have paid off three millions of the national debt; but he did not think it suited his purpose to inform us that, in the year when we first began to pay, he had created a new debt of a million, by issuing exchequer bills to that amount; and that this year we are creating another new debt of a million. He did not either bring into his estimate about two millions, which we have received during the time from the East-India Company and otherwise, in accidental aids, and surely no inconsiderable aids; still less did he think proper to mention an increase in the navy debt to the amount of £500,000. If the right honourable gentleman had stated all the circumstances, it would have appeared that, with the assistance of more than four

millions, he had succeeded in the very notable attempt of paying three millions of national debt. But the time must come when the bubble would burst and our illusions be dissipated. It was better to meet our situation fairly and honourably; by postponing the evil day our distress would only accumulate; and when we expected to drink of the cup of gladness, we should find nothing but the bitter dregs of disappointment.

Upon such an occasion as the present, Mr. Sheridan remarked, he should yield to what he considered as the indispensable necessity of moving for certain papers; and that the house should go into a committee to consider the same. He hoped that, if his motion was acceded to, it would be a committee, and such a one as might easily be obtained in that house, of independent members taken indifferently; and not such a committee as made the report upon which the chancellor of the exchequer had founded his argument, in his own favour, upon more occasions than one, and from whence he had derived his principal illustration. Making this remark, he could sincerely add that he neither felt a wish to have that committee discharged, nor meant to call in question the independency of their minds and the purity of their intentions.

JUNE 11.

WAYS AND MEANS.

Mr. Gilbert reported eighteen resolutions agreed to in the committee of ways and means. The report having been received, Mr. Pitt expressed the satisfaction with which he now found it admitted, on all hands, that the income of the coun try was greater than the amount at which it had been estimated by the committee of finance in 1786. This was a point gained; and gentlemen who had been among the foremost to deny the probability of the public income arriving at the amount of the given estimate for the year 1790, were now contented to resort to single questions, which were easily answered. The business would daily prove less intricate; and as the honourable gentleman opposite to him had, in his remarks the preceding day, himself admitted that the income had so increased, [Mr. Sheridan looked as if he thought the conclusion not just] though, by his gesture, he seemed now to deny it; all that remained for him to say was, that notwithstanding it was impossible for him to answer for the unforeseen circumstances which might arise to prevent it, there was every reason to believe if matters went on in their ordinary course, that the expenditure would be reduced to that level.

Mr. SHERIDAN observed that, aware that assertion on the one side, contradicted by assertion on the other, could prove nothing;

he really had not the smallest inclination to have spoken that day, until the right honourable gentleman thought proper to deduce an argument from his gesture. He begged the right honourable gentleman to understand that he was by no means ready to admit, that the public income had increased beyond the estimate for the year 1790, given in the report to the committee of revenue of 1786; and upon taking the public income upon an average of three years back, he believed it would be found the fact was, that it had not arrived even to the level of that estimate. When the right honourable gentleman then stated his expectation of extraordinary resources, he had declared what he was not less willing to declare at present, that the right honourable gentleman had overrated them; and, if he came then to borrow a million, it proved that he did overrate them at the time in question. The right honourable gentleman had taken notice of his gesture; he was sorry he had used any, as it had brought on a discussion which could answer no end. Yet, upon the preceding day, less than a gesture had been converted into an argument ;—his silence had been construed as an admission of the facts as stated by an honourable gentleman opposite to him and the chancellor of the exchequer, who had both directly contradicted him respecting his assertion that, in 1786, a million had been borrowed by exchequer bills. The right honourable gentleman had, in lofty language, and with a degree of petulance, denied that he borrowed the million, since the report had been made by the committee of finance. In fact, the right honourable gentleman seemed extremely sore upon the subject.

Here Mr. Pitt and other gentlemen sarcastically smiled.

Mr. Sheridan said, if the right honourable gentleman had no better resources than in the smiles of his friends, he was poorly off; but neither laughter nor sneers should prevent him from asserting that his silence did not prove him in the wrong. The fact was, as gentlemen might recollect, in 1785 the chancellor of the exchequer took credit for two millions of exchequer bills, and declared at the time, that probably he should not have occasion for more than one million; in which case, the bills for the second million should not be issued. It turned out that only one million was issued in 1785, and in 1786 the chancellor of the exchequer so stated it, and made the second million a part of that year's ways and means. The million had, in substance, if not precisely

and strictly, been borrowed since the report had been made by the revenue committee. There was one material part of his speech the preceding day, Mr. Sheridan said, of which the right honourable gentleman had not thought proper to take the smallest notice, and that was his proposition for the appointment of an impartial committee to examine the public accounts, and make their report upon them. He had himself expressly declared that he would not enter into any discussion of the subject upon the preceding day, because the debate which must have arisen would only have consisted of assertion on one hand, and denial on the other, without the possibility of affording conviction to any; and because it would not have been in their power to come at any thing like proof for want of proper papers to refer to. The right honourable gentleman had chosen to understand him, the preceding day, as if he had meant merely to move certain resolutions; whereas the appointment of a fair committee was his object; and if such a committee were appointed, it would be for the committee to examine the public accounts; and he was sure it would end in a complete detection of the delusion and fallacy of the right honourable gentleman, and a full justification of what he had advanced.

Mr. Steele repeated his assertion that the additional million of exchequer bills was borrowed in 1785, and not in 1786.

Mr. Sheridan answered, it was true that the exchequer bills were voted in 1785, but they had not been added to the debt till 1786. The miserable quibble under which the fact was attempted to be concealed was this: in 1785 the chancellor of the exchequer obtained a vote for two millions of additional exchequer bills, one million only of which (he had said) it was probable would be wanted; but it would be proper to have the other million as a reserve, in case there should be occasion for it. One million of these bills was kept in reserve accordingly; they were unnecessarily issued in 1786, when the right honourable gentleman had resolved to bring forward his new plan of finances, and £700,000 of them actually remained unissued when the report of the revenue committee was laid before the house.

Thus much, Mr. Sheridan added, that he felt himself obliged to remark, lest his silence should be construed into an admission of the right honourable gentleman's statement.

Mr. Steele observed, that the budget of 1786, and what then passed, had been