ask, what Spain has, hitherto, been able to effect by all her menaces, numerous and ferocious as they have been, or by all her murders, bloody and unnatural as they have been experienced? Has the desorder, she sought to remedy, in any way, abated? Mexia told the Cortes, "that if, instead of 4000, they sent out 40,000 Spaniards, they might then, perhaps, be able to boast being the second conquerors; but so small a number, at the same time, that it evinced the weakness of their resources, served only to embitter the minds of the people against the Europeans; and implicate the honour of the national congress, who, by this means, sanctioned a war, that, hitherto, might be considered as a war of the viceroys." "Is it not," said deputy Alcocer," a terrible thing, to send troops out, which we want so much at home, and when we even require an English garrison in Cadiz? To equip them against brethren, with the very same succours, they have themselves liberally sent over to us, for our defence against the French! To arm them with the very arms and cloathing, which the British have supplied us with, to fight the enemy at home; and which they would, by no means give against America, for whom they are now mediating"

Such, was the strenuous language, by which the American deputies sought relief for their suffering country; such were the arguments, on which they founded their claims. But the order of the day in Cadiz, was war, and the danger immediately before them, was forgotten for a distant object. Motives of interest and revenge, urged them on, even the common soldiers, seemed to join in the enthusiasm displayed, they anticipated scenes of plunder and pillage. But, when officers, rushing through thick

and thin, have been able to make rapid fortunes, in the manner of which some examples have been adduced, we need not wonder, that there was such a readiness to go over to the scene of action. It was an old principle of tyranny, for an arbitrary monarch, to attempt to beggar his subjects into submission, but Spain seeks to murder hers into subjection. She seems to endite a whole people, as if she would proceed against the criminal conduct of a few individuals. Are, then, the feelings of millions, thus to be insulted? The manner in which Spain has, hitherto, legislated for Spanish America, more particularly since her own revolution, has been by sending over an armed force; but can there be any thing more inconsistent, or more unjust, than for the head of a political union of equal communities, to insist on, and enforce a measure, the justice and expediency of which, has not been proved by the representative body of all? If resisted, and if the act is proved both illegal and vexatious, can there be any thing more criminal, than for such presiding power, thus arrogating to itself, the authority confided solely for the purposes of general welfare and defence; instantly to proclaim rebellion, beat to arms, and put the offending parties, under the ban? Will they not soon discover, that a government which treats a claim of liberty and equity, as an offence of high treason, is a government, to which submission is equivalent to slavery? Did the conduct of the Spanish Americans, in point of law and right, amount to a criminal rebellion, it would only warrant and authorize the presiding power, to apprehend and bring the culprits to condign punishment; but it would not give its agents, the right of rushing into indiscriminate murder and desolation, thus confounding innocence with guilt. The pre

sent coercion of Spain, is a qualified hostility carried on against 17 millions of people, rather than the punishment of rebellious subjects. It is rather a war to exterminate, than to promote the slow solemnities of justice.

§ So extensive, and compared with Spain, so populous a country as Spanish America, is not to be treated as a mean dependant, who may be neglected without damage, or provoked without danger. It is not a partial, narrow, and occasional system, that is suited to the government of 17 millions of distant people; and if their complaints against the late exercise of authority, have been founded, they have a right to be heard, and amply redressed. It is unjust, in the extreme, thus to sport with so large a mass of the feelings and interests of the human race. It is not from theory, or a wanton spirit of innovation, that the Spanish Americans have complained of the badness of those principles, by which they were governed. They fairly judge of them, by actual grievances, against which, to the despotic monarchs, and to their arbitrary ministers, they had often remonstrated, in vain. Their ideas of misgovernment, did not originate in any hasty or wicked propensity to change; but, in the badness of the existing constitution of things, and in fatal experience. They, forcibly, felt the truth of that established axiom of politics, that in large bodies, the circulation of power, is always weakest at the extremities. They experienced the galling and vexatious hardships, of having no local check over the acts of despotic chiefs; and the misery and degradation of a people, who have no redress, but a distance of 2000 leagues. Placed as they were, remote from the first mover of power, they shared all its defects, without enjoying any of its advantages. They conceived

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it unjust to be governed by laws, interpreted at the will of judges who were estranged to them: and in the for⚫mation of which, they had no part. They considered it

illegal to be stripped of their property by the arbitrary edict of a premier, and still more so, for that property, to be squandered on a corrupt court, or in prosecuting wars in which they had no interest, and this without any account being rendered in to them of its disbursement.In short, they judged it inconsistent, not to be allowed to legislate and administer in their own concerns, since this has always been held, as the immutable condition and eternal law, of every extensive and detached empire.

These are the principal grounds of complaint which Spanish America, urged, and to refuse her justice and redress, Spain has had to subvert those very principles, on which she has founded her new constitution; and to prove that the inhabitants of her ultramarine provinces, ought not to be free, she has had to recur to base stratagem and force; and even to depreciate those very blessings, for which she herself has been so long fighting. That they may not be free and equal, she has had to say, they are incapable of being so. To shew that these benefits, are incompatible with the condition of dwellers under the tropics, the votaries of Spanish subjection, have had to laugh to scorn, the very principles in which Spain now glories, and to borrow invectives from the works of a Paw. It was putting the Spanish Americans, under the trammels of an abject minority, to suppose that their liberty was more secure, when placed in trust of a distant body, having only the shadow of a general Cortes, than when given in charge to themselves. Were Spain fifty times stronger than she is, it would only be lawful, to govern a distant

but equal part of her empire, in one way; and that is, according to the principles of right reason and justice. For this, she is answerable to the world at large. This lesson, also, she might learn from the fundamental precepts of sound policy. Allegiance is the inseparable companion of happiness and content. Precipitated as Spain now stands, into a destructive warfare, if she seeks to conciliate, she must previously concede. If she adopts this plan, she must first ask herself, whether the ultramarine provinces, in fact, possess a practical equality with those of the Peninsula; and whether they enjoy all, the laws grant, and their happiness and prosperity require. If not, it is her duty to see that all is fully guaranteed to them; and whilst every tie of gratitude and interest, lead her again to cement their connection, she will find this can only be done, by removing the grounds of difference.Peace, implies reconciliation, and where a violent and acrimonious dispute has preceded, mutual concessions must be its forerunners. Peace, as Burke said, ought to be sought in the spirit of peace, and laid in principles, purely pacific.

A superiour power, may offer peace to an inferiour one, without implicating its honour, and without losing in the eyes of the world. Nay, the offer itself, is often construed into magnanimity; and at least, it is never dishonourable, or too late, to correct an error. If Spain continues to prosecute this unjust and unnatural war, without checking that flood of acrimony that has been let loose, she shews to the world, that she spurns all laws, both human and divine; that she is no longer bound by any of those ties, which link man to his fellow species; and, in the future, she can behold nothing, but clouds and