* * * * *
=_Fisher Ames, 1738-1808._= (Manual, p. 487.)
From the "Speech on the British Treaty." April 15, 1795.
=_68._= OBLIGATION OF NATIONAL GOOD FAITH.
The consequences of refusing to make provision for the treaty are not
all to be foreseen. By rejecting, vast interests are committed to the
sport of the winds: chance becomes the arbiter of events, and it is
forbidden to human foresight to count their number, or measure their
extent. Before we resolve to leap into this abyss, so dark and so
profound, it becomes us to pause, and reflect upon such of the dangers
as are obvious and inevitable. If this assembly should be wrought into
a temper to defy these consequences, it is vain, it is deceptive, to
pretend that we can escape them. It is worse than weakness to say, that
as to public faith, our vote has already settled the question. Another
tribunal than our own is already erected; the public opinion, not merely
of our own country, but of the enlightened world, will pronounce a
judgment that we cannot resist, that we dare not even affect to despise.
... This, sir, is a cause that would be dishonored and betrayed if I
contented myself with appealing only to the understanding. It is too
cold, and its processes are too slow, for the occasion.
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