Page:The Annual Register 1758.djvu/240

 226 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1758.

a pretence for executing the refolu- hoftility in the county of Bentheim, tion they had taken to invade his of which the king was in pofTeffion, majefty's dominions, in contempt and which France thought fhe could of the laws of equity and jufticc. put into the hands of the count of This fatal defign was foon put that name, by virtue of the author into execution. Was the public rity which fhe arrogated of fu- ignorant what the king's territo- preme judge of the empire. To ries have fuffered by that invafion, colour thefe violence, (he had no we could gi\'T? it a long detail on other pretence left but the quality this head. The fuburbs of Zell of guaran^e of the peace of Weft- burnt, the to.vn of Hoy almoft re- phalia. She pretend?, that to per- duced to aflies, without any reafon form thisobligation, fhe might fend of war, fo many villages plundered, troops into Germ^nv ; that the fo many towns ravaged, almolt all King of Pruflia had invaded Saxony the horfes of the country carried and Boliemia ; that the king and away, the country forsged, exac- his allies, by fupporting the caufe tions amounting to immenfe fums, of his Pruflian majefty with an indecencies committed with regard army, had formally declared them- to the king's principal ofiicers : all felves adherents to the breaker of thefe horrors will tranfmit to the the public peace, and confequently latefr poflerity, the remembrance of their countries ought to be treated aninvafion equally unjult andcruel. as thofe of enemies. If France could jaftify her condudl; It is true that it is againft the in the eyes of the world, fhe would Landgrave of Hefl'e-CalTel, that ■not fail to give valid reafons for this pretence of guarantee is chief- the invafion of the eledorate ; ly urged; but as no better reafon is but no fuch thing appears in the ailedged tojuflify the invafion of the paperpublilhcd in her defence. It different (tates of the empire, as the is true, fhe alledges the war of king befides confiders the conduct England, and hoftilities commenc- of his ferene highnefs the Landgrave ed, as fhe fays, by the Hanoverians; of HefTe Caflel as both jult and but fhe yet barely touches upon glorious, an^las he never pretends thefe two article?, (he fees that to feparate the caufe of that prince this would be sn open violation of from his own ; this reafon, which the belt: efiablifned maxims of the France gives for her conduit, ought law of n.ttions, and would involve not to be left unanfwered. the empire in continual wars, if it The parallel fuppofes that the might be maintained that the ftates King of PrufTia was the aggre/Tor of which it was compofed, could in the war with her majeity the be attacked for quarrels that regard cmprefs queen, and that he had only their fovereigns in quality of not fufficient reafon to take up arms fovereign powers. in his own defence. How many If the approach of a numerotjs things might be urged in anAver to French army ought not to be con- this imputation ? Count Fleming's iidered as a declaration of war, at remarkable letter of the 28th of lealt, they cannot deny, but that July 1756, fpeaksin avery different before the two armies were near flrain. But as it is not our defign enough to come to blows, Marfhal at prefent to jullify the King of d'Etrees committed the lirli ads of Pruffia, who has no need of a fc»