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By these measures have the Dutch been delivered from their terrours, and encouraged to deliberate freely upon the state of Europe, and prepare for the support of the Pragmatick sanction. But the common cause has been most evidently advanced by gaining the king of Prussia, by whose defection the balance of the war was turned, and at least thirty thousand men taken away from the scale of France.
Their present disputes, my lords, must be, therefore, on some other question; and what question can be now before them which can produce any difficulties, but that which regards the support of the Pragmatick sanction?
On the 9th of October, 1740, half Europe was thrown into confusion by the death of Charles the sixth, emperour of Germany, by whose death all the hereditary dominions of the house of Austria descended, according to the pragmatick sanction, to his eldest daughter, who was married to the duke of Lorrain, at the time of the emperour's death, duke of Tuscany.
This will certainly be openly opposed by all those powers who are strong enough to make head against it, and secretly obstructed by those, whose weakness makes them afraid of publick declarations. Do you intend to support the Pragmatick sanction?
But, my lords, if it be granted, that the Pragmatick sanction is obligatory to us, though it is violated by every other power; that we should labour to reduce the powers of Europe to an equipoise, whenever accident or folly produces any alteration of the balance; and that we are now not to preserve the house of Austria from falling, but raise it from the dust, and restore it to its ancient splendour, even at the hazard of a war with that power which now gives laws to all the western nations; yet it will not surely be asserted, that we ought to be without limits, that we ought to preserve the house of Austria, not only by the danger of our own country, but by its certain ruin, and endeavour to avert the possibility of slavery, by subjecting ourselves to miseries more severe than the utmost arrogance of conquest, or the most cruel wantonness of tyranny, would inflict upon us.
The senate could not insist that we should stand neuter, till all those, who were engaged by treaty to support the Pragmatick sanction, should appear willing to fulfil their stipulations; for even France is to be numbered among those who have promised to support the house of Austria in its possessions, however she may now endeavour to take them away.
The Pragmatick sanction, my lords, by which she claims all the hereditary dominions of her family, cannot change the nature of right and wrong, nor invalidate any claim before subsisting, unless by the consent of the prince by whom it was made.
We ought, undoubtedly, to furnish the troops which we promised, and ought to have sent them when they were first demanded; but there is no necessity that we should supply the deficiencies of every other power, and that we should determine to stand alone in defence of the Pragmatick sanction; that we should, by romantick generosity, impoverish our country, and entail upon remotest posterity poverty and taxes.
For the support of the house of Austria, and the assertion of the Pragmatick sanction, no man can be more zealous than myself; I am convinced how closely the interest of this nation and that of the Austrian family are united, and how much either must be endangered by the ruin of the other, and, therefore, I shall not delay, for a single moment, my consent to any measures that may reestablish our interest on the continent, and rescue Germany once more from the jaws of France.
That they are intended for the support of the queen of Hungary has been, indeed, asserted; and this contract has been produced as an instance of the zeal of our ministers for the assertion of the Pragmatick sanction, the preservation of the liberties of Europe, and the suppression of the ambitious enterprises of the house of Bourbon; but surely, my lords, had the assistance of that illustrious princess been their sole or principal intention, had they in reality dedicated the sum which is to be received by the troops of Hanover, to the sacred cause of publick faith and universal liberty, they might have found methods of promoting it much more efficaciously at no greater expense.
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