Page:Life of William Shelburne (vol 1).djvu/281

Rh will excuse me, I am sure, when I hazard my thoughts to you, as it depends greatly upon you whether they become opinions. But by all I find from some authentic letters from America, nothing can be more serious than its present state; and, though it is my private opinion, it would be well for this country to be back where it was a year ago, I even despair of a repeal effecting that, if it is not accompanied with some circumstances of a firm conduct, and some system immediately following such a concession."

Mr. Pitt replied to this letter as follows:—

—I am honoured with your Lordship's friendly and confidential letter, the contents of which bear such marks of kind and flattering sentiments on my subject as I little deserve or can ever forget. The clear view of the outline of men and things which your Lordship gives me, affords a large field for reflection, and certainly demands no small circumspection, with exact and nice limits in action where a conjecture too much or too little must qualify every step, wise or weak, salutary or ruinous.

The line your Lordship took the first day in the House of Lords I should have been proud and happy could I have been able to have held pace with in the House of Commons; being under the strongest conviction that, allowing full force to all the striking topics of upholding in the present instance the legislative and executive authority over America, the ruinous side of the dilemma to which we are brought is the making good by force there, preposterous and infatuated errors in policy here; and I shall unalterably sustain that opinion.

The opening from Lord Rockingham to your Lordship and Colonel Barré, which you are so good as to impart to me, you will easily believe could not surprise me; nothing being so natural as for Ministers, under the extreme double pressure of affairs all in confusion, and a doubtful internal situation, to recur to distinguished abilities for assistance. The further resource to which