princes who disputed our establishment, and may esteem ourselves so far fortunate. But the claims of the banished family, I fear, are not yet antiquated, and who can foretell that their future attempts will produce no greater disorder?
The disputes between privilege and prerogative may easily be composed by laws, and votes, and conferences, and concessions, where there is tolerable temper or prudence on both sides, or on either side. Among contending titles the question can only be determined by the sword, and by devastation, and by civil war.
A prince who fills the throne with a disputed title dares not arm his subjects, the only method of securing a people fully, both against domestic oppression and foreign conquest.
Notwithstanding all our riches and renown, what a critical escape did we lately make from dangers, which were owing, not so much to bad conduct and ill success in war, as to the pernicious practice of mortgaging our finances, and the still more pernicious maxim of never paying off our encumbrances? Such fatal measures could never have been embraced had it not been to secure a precarious establishment.111