From the part Mr. Burke took in the American Revolution, it was
natural that I should consider him a friend to mankind; and as our
acquaintance commenced on that ground, it would have been more
agreeable to me to have had cause to continue in that opinion than to
change it.
At the time Mr. Burke made his violent speech last winter in the
English Parliament against the French Revolution and the National
Assembly, I was in Paris, and had written to him but a short time
before to inform him how prosperously matters were going on. Soon
after this I saw his advertisement of the Pamphlet he intended to
publish: As the attack was to be made in a language but little
studied, and less understood in France, and as everything suffers by
translation, I promised some of the friends of the Revolution in that
country that whenever Mr. Burke's Pamphlet came forth, I would answer
it. This appeared to me the more necessary to be done, when I saw the
flagrant misrepresentations which Mr. Burke's Pamphlet contains; and
that while it is an outrageous abuse on the French Revolution, and
the principles of Liberty, it is an imposition on the rest of the
world.
I am the more astonished and disappointed at this conduct in Mr.
Burke, as (from the circumstances I am going to mention) I had formed
other expectations.
I had seen enough of the miseries of war, to wish it might never more
have existence in the world, and that some other mode might be found
out to settle the differences that should occasionally arise in the
neighbourhood of nations. This certainly might be done if Courts were
disposed to set honesty about it, or if countries were enlightened
enough not to be made the dupes of Courts. The people of America had
been bred up in the same prejudices against France, which at that
time characterised the people of England; but experience and an
acquaintance with the French Nation have most effectually shown to
the Americans the falsehood of those prejudices; and I do not believe
that a more cordial and confidential intercourse exists between any
two countries than between America and France.
When I came to France, in the spring of 1787, the Archbishop of
Thoulouse was then Minister, and at that time highly esteemed. I
became much acquainted with the private Secretary of that Minister, a
man of an enlarged benevolent heart; and found that his sentiments
and my own perfectly agreed with respect to the madness of war, and
the wretched impolicy of two nations, like England and France,
continually worrying each other, to no other end than that of a
mutual increase of burdens and taxes. That I might be assured I had
not misunderstood him, nor he me, I put the substance of our opinions
into writing and sent it to him; subjoining a request, that if I
should see among the people of England, any disposition to cultivate
a better understanding between the two nations than had hitherto
prevailed, how far I might be authorised to say that the same
disposition prevailed on the part of France? He answered me by letter
in the most unreserved manner, and that not for himself only, but for
the Minister, with whose knowledge the letter was declared to be
written.
I put this letter into the, hands of Mr. Burke almost three years
ago, and left it with him, where it still remains; hoping, and at the
same time naturally expecting, from the opinion I had conceived of
him, that he would find some opportunity of making good use of it,
for the purpose of removing those errors and prejudices which two
neighbouring nations, from the want of knowing each other, had
entertained, to the injury of both.
When the French Revolution broke out, it certainly afforded to Mr.
Burke an opportunity of doing some good, had he been disposed to it;
instead of which, no sooner did he see the old prejudices wearing
away, than he immediately began sowing the seeds of a new inveteracy,
as if he were afraid that England and France would cease to be
enemies. That there are men in all countries who get their living by
war, and by keeping up the quarrels of Nations, is as shocking as it
is true; but when those who are concerned in the government of a
country, make it their study to sow discord and cultivate prejudices
between Nations, it becomes the more unpardonable.
With respect to a paragraph in this work alluding to Mr. Burke's
having a pension, the report has been some time in circulation, at
least two months; and as a person is often the last to hear what
concerns him the most to know, I have mentioned it, that Mr. Burke
may have an opportunity of contradicting the rumour, if he thinks
proper.