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A37441
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Some reflections on a pamphlet lately published entituled An argument shewing that a standing army is inconsistent with a free government and absolutely destructive to the constitution of the English monarchy
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Defoe, Daniel, 1661?-1731.
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1697
(1697)
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Wing D848; ESTC R29705
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20,562
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34
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General of 40000 Men. I remember 't was a great cry among the Iacobite Party about four Year ago what a vast Charge are we at about a War for the Confederates Damn the Confederates let us keep a good Fleet and we are able to defend our selves against all the World let who will go down and who will go up no Body will dare to meddle with us But God be thanked the King knew better than these what was the true Interest of England a War in Flanders is a War in England let who will be the Invaders for a good Barrier between a Kingdom and a powerful Enemy is a thing of such Consequence that the Dutch always thought it well worth the Charges of a War to assist the Spaniard for thereby they kept the War from their own Borders and so do we In defending this silly Equivalent of a Fleet he has the Vanity to say If our Fleet be well mann'd 't is a ridiculous thing to think of any Princes Invading us and yet we found it otherwise This very War we found King Iames invaded Ireland and the French sent him an Aid of 8000 Men who stood their Ground so well at the Battle of the Boyn that if King Iames had done his part as well it might have been a dearer Victory than is was after this he fetch'd those 8000 off again and after that sent Monsieur St. Ruth and after that a Relief to Limerick tho' it came too late and all this notwithstanding we had the greatest Fleet at Sea that ever England had before thâ— time since it was a Nation Thus Experience Bafles this foolish Equivalent for Armies are not Transported with so much Difficulty and the Six hundred Sail the P. of Orange brought with him had not been absolutely necessary for 14000 Men but there were vast Stores Artillery Arms and heavy Baggage with them which are not always necessary for we know Monsieur Pointy carried 4500 Men with him on his Expedition to Cartagena in but 16 Ships and the 8000 Men before-mentioned sent to Ireland were carried in not above 35 or 38 Sail. Another wretched Equivalent which this Author would have us trust to is the Militia and these he magnifies as sufficient to defend us against all the Enemies in the World and yet at the same time so Debases them as to make them nothing in Comparison of a small Army Nay he owns that notwithstanding these we are undone and our Liberties destroyed if the King be trusted but with a few Guards This is such a piece of Logick as no Man can understand If a Militia be regulated and Disciplin'd I say they may enslave us as well as an Army and if not they cannot be able to defend us if they are unable to Defend us they are insignificant and if able dangerous But says the Author there is no danger from the Militia for they are our selves and their Officers are Country Gentlemen of Estates And is not our Army full of English Gentlemen of Estates and Fortunes and have we not found them as inflexible to the Charms of Tyranny when closetted in the late Reign and as true to the Protestant Interest and Liberties of England as any Country Gentlemen or Freeholders or Citizens in England Did they not lay down their Commissions did they not venture to disobey his illegal Commands when the Cowardly Citizens address'd him with their nauseous Flattering fulsome Harrangues thank'd him for their Bondage and gave up their Charters and Priviledges even before he ask'd for them These are the Persons that must guard our Liberties and they would be finely Guarded God help us I remember a Speech which I have to show in Manuscript of Sir Walter Rawleigh on the Subject of the Spanish Invasion which comes directly to this Case The Author of this Pamphlet to instance in the prodigious Navy that is necessary to bring over a small Army tells us the Spanish Armado Embark'd but 18000 Men but he forgot that they were to take the Prince of Parma on Board from Flanders with 28000 old Low Country Soldiers more with which Army as Sir Walter Rawleigh observ'd to that Gentleman it was no improbable thing to think of Conquering this Kingdom and Queen Elizabeth was so sensible of it that she often told Sir Walter that if they had not been beaten at Sea they had been all undone for her Armies were all Tumultuary Troops Militia and the like To proceed I 'll grant all the Improbabilities which he suggests of the French King 's reviving a War which has been so fatal to him And as to King Iames Coming truly I 'll allow the Militia are fittest at all times to deal with him but to use his own Method of supposing the worst I 'll suppose the French King waving the Ceremony of a League and a Declaration of War when he has recovered Breath a little shou'd as much on a sudden as can be break with us single and pour in an Army of 50000 Men upon us I 'll suppose our Fleet may be by accident so lockt in as King Iames's was for what has been may be and they take that Opportunity and get on Shore and to oppose their Army truly we raise the Militia a Fine Shew they wou'd make but what wou'd they do against 60 Batalions of French and Swiss Infantry wou'd this Gentleman venture to be hang'd if they run all away and did not fire a Gun at them I am sure I wou'd not But on the other Hand if the Militia are a sufficient Guard against a Foreign Power so they are against a Home Power especially since this Home Power may be kept down to a due Ballance so as may but suffice to keep us from being insulted by a Foreign Enemy for Instance suppose the King were to entertain in constant Pay 20000 Men including his Guards and Garrisons the Militia of England Regulated and Disciplin'd join'd to these might do somewhat but by themselves nothing I can give him innumerable Instances of the Services of the Militia but I never heard or read of any real Bravery from them but when join'd with Regular Troops To Instance once for all 't is notorious that when the Prince of Conde attackt the Citizens of Paris at Charentoâ— that Populous City being all in an Uproar sent a Detachment of 20000 Men to dislodge the Prince who with 1500 Horse and Dragoons drove them all away and they never lookt behind them till they got within the City Walls Another Necessity for keeping up a certain Number of Troops is the vast Expence and Difficulty of making a New-rais'd Army fit for Service I am bold to say as the Nature of Fighting is now chang'd and the Art of War improv'd were the King now to raise a New Army and to be Commanded by New Officers Gentlemen who had seen no Service it should cost him Three Years Time and 30000 Mens Lives to bring them into a Capacity to face an Enemy Fighting
is not like what it has been I find our Author is but a Book Soldier for he says Men may learn to be Engineers out of a Book but I never heard that a Book Gunner could Bombard a Town the Philosophy of it may be Demonstrated in Scales and Diagrams but 't is the Practice that produces the Experiments 't is not handling a Musket and knowing the Words of Command will raise a Man's Spirit and teach him to Storm a Counterscarp Men must make the Terrors of the War familiar to them by Custom before they can be brought to those Degrees of Gallantry Not that there is an intrinsick Value in a Red Coat and yet the Argument is not at all enforced by the Foul Language he gives the Souldiers while they are fighting in Flanders and laying down their Lives in the Face of the Enemy to purchase our Liberty 't is hard and unkind to be treated by a rascally Pamphleteer with the scandalous Term of Ragamuffins and Hen-roost Robbers I am no Soldier nor ever was but I am sensible we enjoy the present Liberty the King his Crown and the Nation their Peace bought with the Price of the Blood of these Ragamuffins as he calls them and I am for being civil to them at least I might descend a little to examine what a strange Country England would be when quite dismantled of all her Heroes as he calls them truly were I but a Pirate with a Thousand Men I wou'd engage to keep the Coast in a Constant Alarm We must never pretend to bear any Reputation in the World No Nation would value our Friendship or fear to affront us Not our Trade Abroad would be secure nor our Trade at Home Our Peace which we see now establish'd on a good Foundation what has procur'd it a War and the Valour of our Arms speaking of Second Causes And what will preserve it truly nothing but the Reputation of the same Force and if that be sunk how long will it continue Take away the Cause and our Peace which is the Effect will certainly follow Let me now a little examine the History of Nations who have run the same risque this Gentleman would have us do and not to go back to remote Stories of the Carthaginians who the Romans could never vanquish till they got them to dismiss their Auxiliary Troops The Citizens of Constantinople who always deny'd their Emperor the Assistance of an Army were presently ruin'd by the Turks We will come nearer home The Emperor Ferdinand II. over-run the whole Protestant Part of Germany and was at the point of Dissolving the very Constitution of their Government and all for what of their having a Competent Force on foot to defend themselves and if they had not been deliver'd by the Great Gustavus Adolphus God Almighty must have wrought a Miracle to have sav'd them Next look into Poland which our Author reckons to be one of the Free Countries who defend themselves without a standing Army First he must understand for I perceive he knows little of the Matter that Poland has not defended it self or if it has it has been at a very sorry rate God knows much such a one as we should do without an Army or at much such a rate as we did of old when the Picts and Scots were our Hostile Neighbours Pray let us see how Poland which enjoys its freedom without a standing Army has defended it self First It has been ravag'd on the side of Lithuania by the Effeminate Muscovites and tho' the Poles always beat them in the Field yet they had devoured their Country first before the Polanders Militia could get together On the other hand the Tartars in several volant Excursions have over-run all Vpper Poland Vkrania and Volhinia even to the Gates of Crakow and in about Fifty years 't is allow'd they have carried away a Million of this wretchedly free People into Slavery so that all Asia was full of Polish Slaves On the East side Carolus Gustavus King of Sweden over-run the whole Kingdom took Warsaw Crackow and beat King Casimir out of the Country into Silesia and all in one Campaign and only indeed for want of a Force ready to meet him upon the Frontiers for as soon as Casimir had time to recover himself and Collect an Army he lookt him in the Face and with an Invinsible Resolution fought him wherever he met him But the ruin of the Country was irrepairable in an Age. To come nearer home and nearer to the Matter in hand our Neighbours the Dutch in the Minority of the present King and under the manage of Barnavelt's Principles reviv'd in the Persons of the De Witts to preserve their Liberties as they pretended they would suppress the Power of the House of Orange and Disband their old Army which had establish't their Freedom by the Terror of their Arms and to secure themselves they came to a regulated Militia the very thing this Gentleman talks of Nay this Militia had the Face of an Army and were entertain'd in Pay but the Commissions were given to the Sons of the principal Burghers and the Towns had Governors from among themselves This is just what our Gentleman wou'd have and what came of this These brave Troops were plac'd in Garrisons in the Frontier Towns And in the Year 1672. the French King this very individual French King now regnant during the continuance of the Sacred Peace of Westphalia enters the Country at the Head of two dreadful Armies and these Soldiers that were the Bulwark of the Peoples Liberties surrendred the most impregnable Towns garrison'd some with 2000 some 3000 Men nay some with 6000 without striking a stroke nay faster than the French cou'd well take Possession of them so that in about Forty days he had taken 42 strong Towns which would cost him Seven years to take now tho' no Army were in the Field to disturb him and then the People saw their Error and gave themselves the Satisfaction of Tearing to Pieces the Authors of that pernicious Advice And truly I think these Instances are so lively that I wonder our Author who I perceive is not so ignorant as not to know these things shou'd not have provided some Answer to it for he could not but expect it in any Reply to him These things may a little tell us what is the Effects of a Nations being disarm'd while their Neighbours are in Arms and all this must be answer'd with a Fleet and that may be answer'd with this We may be invaded notwithstanding a Fleet unless you can keep up such a Fleet as can Command the Seas in all parts at the same time or can as Queen Elizabeth did forbid your Neighbours to build Ships But the French King is none of those and his Power at Sea is not be slighted Nor is it so small but it may with too much ease protect an Invasion and it is not safe to put it to that hazard Another Necessity of an