We have experience to teach us, with something like accuracy, what are
the pecuniary demands of the contest for which we must be prepared,
if we enter into a war in the Peninsula. To take only two years and a
half of the last Peninsular War of which I happen to have the accounts
at hand, from the beginning of 1812 to the glorious conclusion of the
campaign of 1814, the expense incurred in Spain and Portugal was about
L33,000,000. Is that an expense to be incurred again, without some
peremptory and unavoidable call of duty, of honour, or of interest?
Such a call we are at all times ready to answer, _come_ (to use the
expression so much decried), _come what may_. But there is surely
sufficient ground for pausing, before we acquiesce in the short and
flippant deduction of a rash consequence from false premises, which
has been so glibly echoed from one quarter to another, during the last
four months. 'Oh! we must go to war with France, for we are bound to
go to war in defence of Portugal. Portugal will certainly join Spain
against France; France will then attack Portugal; and then our
defensive obligation comes into play.' Sir, it does no such thing.
If Portugal is attacked by France, or by any other Power, without
provocation, Great Britain _is_ indeed bound to defend her: but if
Portugal wilfully seeks the hostility of France, by joining against
France in a foreign quarrel, there is no such obligation on Great
Britain. The letter of treaties is as clear as the law of nations is
precise upon this point: and as I believe no British statesman ever
lived, so I hope none ever will live, unwise enough to bind his
country by so preposterous an obligation, as that she should go to
war, not merely in defence of an ally, but at the will and beck of
that ally, whenever ambition, or false policy, or a predominant
faction, may plunge that ally into wars of her own seeking and
contriving.
Pages:
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173