War as well as of Trade shall pay to one another wheresoever they come to encounter in Sailing how that thereupon it is become the true Interest of England to have Scotland advanced into such a state and condition as that it may be able to provide Equip and Maintain good Squadrons of Men of War Which as it cannot be done without their attainment unto a considerable Foreign Trade so they may be enabled speedily to effect it by means of their Colony at Darien provided they be supported in it And as Scotland upon their being in a condition to send out a Warlike Fleet of their own will in case of a War against Great Britain save England the trouble and charge of maintaining Men of War on the Coast of Scotland for covering that Nation from Invasion as it hath several times both lately and more Anciently been forced to do so it may with confidence be affirmed that neither France nor Holland will be very forward to quarrel with England when beside their own great Naval Power they will have a considerable Marine Strength from Scotland ready at all times to joyn and assist them And should it so fall out that a War is not with Honour and Safety to be avoided between Great Britain and either of those Nations which is so far from being impossible that it lies within a probable view Scotland thro' having a potent Naval Power of its own will upon a conjunction in that case of its Strength with England give the King of Great Britain such a Superiority over his Enemies in Number and Force of Ships as may in the ordinary course of Providence render him unquestionably victorious which will redound chiefly to the Profit and Glory of England Nor will they only in such case be in a condition both to protect their own Trade and to assist the English with a Squadron of Stout Men of War towards the encreasing of the Royal Navy but they will by reason of the Situation of their Country and the conveniency of their Ports be able to cover and defend the trading Ships of England towards the East and to secure their Navigation to Hamburgh Swedeland Denmark Poland Muscow Greenland c. which is very needful to be kept safe because of the Pitch Tarr Canvass Timber as well as of divers other Commodities which are brought from those Parts whereof several if not most of them are indispensibly necessary for the building repairing and equipping of Ships of all sorts and cannot be so well had in other places Further The more Rich and Opulent that the Scots do grow which they will speedily do by the Gold and Silver which will be dug out of the Mines of Darien and by the Profits that will accrue from such other Productions as that Territory where they are so planted doth afford they will thereby be in the better State and Condition for granting larger supplies to the Crown than they hitherto could and thereupon administer ground as well as occasion for greatly lessening and moderating the Charge which England even in times of Peace but especially of War hath heretofore been necessitated unto And whereas the Scots have been at all times able and thereof given abundant proof during the late War to raise and muster great Numbers of as brave and well-disciplin'd Forces as any Nation of the World can afford yet by reason of their Penury which is a consequence and effect of their want of Foreign Trade and of Colonies in those parts of the Earth from which the great Wealth doth arise and flow into European Countries which their Plantation at Darien will soon cure remedy and relieve them against they could not grant Taxes nor advance Money that would have been sufficient for the Maintaining and Paying of their Troops but there was a necessity of putting them upon the English Establishment which was in part an occasion both of those excessive impositions of all kinds which England became indispensibly oblig'd to fall into the projection and enacting of and of those incredible Debts which it hath contracted doth lye under and cannot speedily redeem it self from For seeing the Kingdom of England how plentifully soever it be furnish'd with Men and able to bring into the Field very numerous as well as admirable Forces could not have rais'd within it self that vast proportion of Military Troops which were thought needful to be kept on foot during the late War which made it to receive and maintain so many thousand of Scots Forces will it not therefore be of great advantage upon any Stress or Exigency of the like Nature hereafter to have the same or a greater proportion of Scots Forces to join them and to come in to their assistance without England's becoming oblig'd either to subsist or to pay them and instead of having them upon Loan and at a great expence of English Treasure to obtain them as a Quota which their Neighbours and Friends will not only at all times be ready to grant and advance but to maintain at their own charges And as it may be affirm'd under all the moral certainty imaginable that the Scots thro' their being upheld and defended in their Calidonian Colony will in a few years be render'd able and will be found ready and forward to come into those Measures of Conjunction and Union of Forces with England in all such Foreign Wars wherein they shall at any time embark so it may from thence be inferr'd that it is the true Interest of the Parliament and People of England to have the Scots not only preserved and protected in the enjoyment of their Plantation in Darien but to give them all the countenance and aid which they can against such whosoever they be that shall attempt either the troubling of them there or the driving them from thence Moreover it might be represented and shew'd at large how much it will be to the advantage of England both with respect to their Plantations in the West-Indies and their own general growth and encrease in Trade and the rendring their whole Traffick and Commerce more secure and profitable than it has been to have the Scots upheld in the possession which they have obtain'd upon the foremention'd American Isthmus and that they be successful and prosperous in the improvement and further extension of their Colony But having said enough in a former Paragraph for the demonstrating of that beyond the being either deny'd or contradicted and the matter being obvious to all Men who are capable of thinking rationally and to any useful purposes and it being withal a Topick which every little and common Writer upon this Subject will not fail thro' inability to enlarge and employ their Conceptions about other things relative hereunto to make their best and utmost of I shall therefore decline the re-assuming the consideration of that Head again here and shall address to the representation of one Medium of Argumentation whereby it will apodictically appear to be the Interest
characters it doth very ill accord with and become yet that it is some consolation both to their Company and their whole Kingdom that the Representation a Messrs les primieres Ministres d' Angleterre The memorial or manifest given into the Lords Justices by the Spanish Ambassador in September last was not in the least occasion'd by nor bottom'd upon any thing relative to their Colony upon the American Isthmus So that whatsoever the Consequences of that Memorial and of his Britannick Majesty just Resentment of it may be yet none of them can either now or hereafter be said to have sprung and flowed from any Fact or Enterprize of the Scots And tho' I do not pretend to any knowledge of those Consultations Treaties and Stipulations save as they are there expressed to have been Sur la succession de la couronne d' Espagne sa Division and Repartition about the Succession to the Crown of Spain and the Division and Repartition of that Monarcy wherein His Majesty having been concerned gave occasion and administred ground for that Memorial which was so displeasing unto Him that he thereupon Commanded the Spanish Ambassador who deliver'd it to depart within Eighteen days out of his Kingdom and in that time not to go out of his Gate yet I hope it will neither be accounted Presumption nor an Intrusion upon Secrets and Mysteries of State to say that nothing could have contributed so much to the obviating all such misunderstandings between the two Crowns as should swell into and terminate in a Rupture as the having protected the Scots in their settlement at Darien would have done For as the having a Câ—lony Establish'd in the very Heart and Bosome of the Spanish American Dominions and accomodated with a Defenceable Harbour that is capable of receiving the whole Naval strength of England would unless the Cabinet Resolutions at Madrid be the Results of Passion and Haughtiness rather than of sedate thoughts Political Wisdom and of Debates where arguments derived from safety and interest cast the scale effectually check the Spaniards against falling into rash and hasty Councils and an infallible motive for restraining the Catholick King from emarquing in a War with His Britannick Majesty because of the unavoidable mischiefs that upon our being so Circumstanced and Stated thro' the possession of that place would attend it in relation to the many great and opulent Territories of the Spanish Monarchy in the West-Indies which are both the sources of all that Wealth and Treasure which inable them to defend their Kingdoms and Provinces in Europe and do afford them the means and advantages of supporting themselves in that veneration and esteem which are paid them and rendred unto that Crown in this part of the World so it is not to be doubted should a War Commence upon any inducements and reasons whatsoever whether fancied or real slight or weighty between the King of Spain and the Monarch of Great Britain but that thro' our being so Posted in the midst of their American Plantations they would soon be made sensible of their betaking themselves thereby to a course and method that will unavoidable issue in their Ruine For tho' no Man that pretendeth to good Sense can have the weakness to imagine nor any who are under the Ties of Allegiance and Fealty can have the Disloyalty to suspect that the coldness and indifference of the Court of England in reference to the Scots being encouraged and supported at Darien to say nothing of the measures that have been taken and pursued not only to the Disheartening and Obstructing them in their Design but to the defeating it thro' rendring as far as could be effected without open and direct hostility their continuance in that place impracticable was either in subserviency to the better concealing and covering those Transactions which were then carrying on and are since discovered and divulged concerning the adjusting and determining the Succession to the Crown of Spain or in order at the expence of the Kingdom of Scotland and the Dishonour as well as the Loss sustained by their African and India Company to have the more easily reconciled what was at that time under Consultation and Treaty towards the being Concerted and Stipulated to the Catholick King and his Ministers yet it may both with Modesty and Safety be affirmed that among other means which would have both Advanced His Majesty above the threats and menaces of the Spaniards who endeavour to allarm him that unless all that he hath projected in the foremention'd Affair be promptement arreste viendra un Guerre Funeste universelle dans toute te Europe speedily renounced there will arise a destructive and general War thro' all Europe but inabled him to justify and to make good by his Power and Force what he hath by his great Prudence and Wisdom been Adjusting and Contracting with others in reference to the foresaid matter It would have also been in some degree useful and subservient thereunto if instead of lending his Name and Authority to those who emitted the Proclamations in the English West-India Plantations prohibiting the holding any Correspondence with or the giving any Assistance unto any Person or Persons that had been Fitted out in Scotland with Ships of Force to settle in some part of America he had vouchsaved unto his Subjects of Scotland those Testimonies of his Royal Care and Zeal for their Success in the expedition they went upon and for their prâ—spering in the design in which they were Embarqu'd as might have made them out of Gratitude Ambitious of Sacrificing their Lives in his Service For as it is a great Satisfaction to a Prince and that which gives him a Reputation and at such a juncture and in those circumstances renders him formidable to those who seem inclined and do only covet a favourable opportunity of declaring themselves his Enemies to be universally known to have a firm Tenure in the Affections and Confidences of all his People and to be understood to have their Wealth and Power ready to be surrendred with readiness and chearfulness unto his Disposal and their Lives chiefly valued by them on the foot of having them to venture at his Command and for the exalting as well as for the maintaining his Honour and Glory so it cannot but both extreamly disquiet him and also lessen his Credit and Veneration with those Potentates that Envy the greatness of his Vndertakings and who dread the Wisdom that displayeth it self in his Projections to find the largest Part and Proportion of the whole Body of his Subjects in one of his Dominions highly discontented with and clamorously complaining and as they think not without just reason of the Conduct and Behaviour of those towards them who being in the highest Places of the Exercise and Administration of the Government do vouch his Orders and his Authority for those Actions that are so ill Resented And that these Proceedings of the King's English Ministers of State and
in the Vertue whereof these things became practicable and have been accomplished For I do reckon there is nothing more demonstrable than that the French King is chiefly indebted to the Profits and Emoluments which have arisen by Manufacture and Trade for all that during the late War he hath been enabled to do both offensively and defensively And while others do amuse and triflingly employ themselves and impertinently and uselessly squander away their time in loading their Memories with naked and insignificant accounts and Memoirs of the Military Facts of that Monarch and of those Confederated against him which were transacted here and there during the late bloody expensive and tedious War I am not ashamed to declare my self one who am rather willing to enquire into represent and to recommend the Springs Originals and Foundations upon which that Potentate was in a condition to support and manage so long a War with so much Reputation to himself and safety to his Territories and People And I do presume to affirm that the main Sources and fundamental means hereof were his former acquisition of Wealth and a continued accession and accruement of new Treasure by Manufacture and Trade It being thereby alone that so large a Quota and Portion of the Gold and Silver dug out of the Spanish Mines of America and of what of the former is gathered in Africa hath either by shorter and more expeditious steps or after longer and wider strides flowed into France and thereupon in the Course of Circulation there hath come at last to be so plentifully lodged in that Princes Exchequer So that it is into Trade and the product thereof that we are principally to resolve the French King 's having been not only able during the last War to cover and protect himself from dishonour and his Kingdom from Ravage and Impoverishment by the irruption of the Troops of the Allies into his Provinces their destruction of his Cities and Towns or the pillaging of his Subjects to a measure and degree that countervailed the attempting and executing any thing of that kind but his having been victorious in several Battles successful in the Conquest of divers strong Holds and Fortifyed places that were thought by some to be impregnable and the rendring himself Master of large and rich Provinces whose Situation and Remoteness were thought Sufficient to have covered them from being insulted and much more to have made it impossible to have subdued them and all this against such a plurality of Confederate Allies and the greatest strongest most numerous and best disciplined united Forces that were ever known in this part of the World to have cemented and Joyned against One Prince and single Kingdom Now I have the more particularly mentioned this not that any should thereby be provoked to complain of or to blame that Monarch because of his employing his Princely solicitude for and exercising his Royal Authority over his People in commanding as well as encouraging their application unto Manufacture and Trade but that his example may be both a Pattern and a motive unto every Nation to enter upon and to pursue the same ways and methods that is any wise qualified for and capable of doing it And especially that they would engage therein with zeal and Industry unto whom upon the advantages which will redound and accrue to him thro' his Subjects improving in Manufactures and in the enlargement and encrease of their Traffick he may be reason of his Neighbourhood become hereafter a more dreadful Enemy than ever he yet was For tho' neither our uneasiness upon the aforementioned Account for the present nor our too Just fears of what may overtake and befall us in time to come can Justify either our being offended with or our speaking undecently of the French King but will only betray and discover our Folly Ill nature and want of Breeding yet it will both become the Wisdom and prove the Interest of the People of England whom He is about Rivalling in Commerce as well as in Naval strength to make it more their care and endeavours to exceed him in each of those And it is and will be every day more and more the great concern of the Scots to emulate and imitate him in these particulars as far and as much as they can And were He at present in actual Hostility with us as who knows how soon he may be yet fas est ab hoste doceri it is both Lawful and commendable to submit to learn of an Enemy and to suffer our selves to be taught by him Nor can it Justly administer offence to any honest and prudent Englishman if I take the Liberty hereupon to subjoyn in a few words that the more the French do cultivate and promote Manufacture and Traffick for which neither his Majesty nor the Parliament of England can righteously quarrel with them nor can attempt to disturb or to obstruct them in their Commerce without some previous Infraction on their part of the Treaty of Reswick The more it should be the Princely care of the King of Great Britain and the sedulous and prudential Study and endeavour of an English Parliament and People that the Scots who being under the same Prince that they are and thereupon so Confederated and linked together as to have the same Friends and Enemies may both have the Advice Councel and Countenance of England to encourage them unto and the Aid and Assistance of their Treasure and Strength and Power to uphold and protect them in Trade For seeing Traffick is the Spring and Fountain of Wealth and that Nations encrease in Riches in proportion to the Kind and Degrees of their Manufacture and the Quality and Extent of their Commerce It naturally followeth that it is both the Interest and Duty of these Kingdoms mutually to further and support one another who being Subjects under one and the same Soveraign are knit and united together by a stronger Cement and by more firm and indissoluble Tyes than Countries under distinct and different Princes are capable of being made by Alliances and Leagues how publickly soever contracted and stipulated and solemnly ratified and confirmed Nor will it I suppose be denyed but that according to the Share which England and Scotland shall acquire and obtain of the Trade of the World the Less will fall to the Portion of the French and the Less vent they will have as well every where for their own Natural and Artificial productions as for what they do Import from Foreign and remote places Nor can it be reasonably contradicted but that Scotland hath been expos'd and stood liable to many Inconveniences and Prejudices by it's having so long and greatly neglected Manufacture and Trade as it hath imprudently and supinely done And had not they of that Nation given undeniable proofs in divers other ways and Instances of their being a Sagacious and Wise and a Laborious and Industrious people such of some other Kingdoms who assume a great Licentiousness in rallying
having seriously Considered and duly Weighed whatsoever could be pretended or alledged against them upon their proceeding to establish a Colony there For the examination whereof they allowed themselves sufficient time in that tho' their Subscriptions were perfected and compleated about the beginning of the year 1696 yet they did not send their Ships from Scotland untill the Month of July 1698 which arrived not in that place until November following And as it is not only hoped but morally certain that great advantages of attaining unto Wealth Power and Honour will thereby accrue and be administred to Scotland so it might easily be Demonstrated that very considerable Benefits will infallibly Redound from thence unto England and that both in times of Peace and of War Seeing as it will be a means whereby in a short time a compendious Way and Passage for Trade to China Japan as well as to the East-Indies may be obtained and rendred secure whereby the English will become qualified and enabled not only to outdo the French who begin to Rival them in Traffick to the latter but to equal the Dutch who do at present far exceed them in it So by the conveniency of the Scots Caledonian Plantation both a great quantity more of the Manufactures of that Kingdom will come to be vented in all the East parts of the World as well as in the Spanish West-Indian Provinces and the expence made less and the returns much Speedier and Surer to and from the latter than they are or ever can be by the way of Cadiz and Malaga And as for the English Plantations in America they will not only have larger and more advantageous occasions of Trading into the Spanish American Colonies but the very Scots of the Calidonian Plantation will will take off and consume abundance of their Commodities and Productions especially theirs of New York and New England for which they will pay in Gold and in Silver and such valuable Goods as the Mines Rivers and Land of Darien do yield and furnish And should a War at any time come to be between the Kings of Great Britain and of Spain as who knoweth what may hereafter fall out Calidonia is and will in that case be found the best Situate place of any in the World from whence and by means whereof to do Hurt and Prejudice to the Spaniards and to yield service to his Britannick Majesty and give his Subjects opportunities of enriching themselves Seeing the Scots Colony there will prove to be not only Posted in the middle and bosom of the Spanish American Ports for Traffick having Carthagena on the East Porto Bèllo on the West and Panama on the South but will be found to stand Situated in the direct way and passage that their Flotas Galleons Armados and Armadilals must go and return to and from Mexico and Peru. Nor on the supposition of such a Hostility arising between these two Crowns as I have mentioned will the English meerly have a larger better and more Fortified Harbour for Ships either of War or Commerce than any of their own West India Plantations do afford But they will have one to Receive Cover and Protect them that is nearer and more adjacent by a hundred Leagues to Porto Bello and Panama than Jamaica and by above three hundred than Barbadoes which of all the English American Colonies are the least distanced from them But seeing I shall have occasion to discourse more fully hereafter of the benefits and advantages which will accrue to the Crown and Kingdom of England by the Scots having settled in Darien and how much upon that account it is both the Interest of the King and of the English Nation that they should be maintained and defended in the possession of their Plantation at Calidonia I shall therefore insist no more upon it under this Head but adjourn what is to be further represented and argued to the foregoing purpose until it will lie more naturally before me in some other Paragraph That which I am then in the next place to advance unto is to Justifie and Prove beyond all possibility of any reasonable Reply that the Scots by their establishing a Colony on the Isthmus of Darien have made no Invasion upon the Rights or Dominions and Territories of the King of Spain nor have therein Acted contrary either to the Laws of Nations or to any Articles of publick Treaties that have intervened or have been Conserted Accorded and Stipulated between the Kings of Great Britain and those of Spain 'T is true his Spanish Majesty hath by several Memorials delivered by his Ministers to his Britannick Majesty or to his Secretaries of State represented remonstrated and complained as if the Scots had thereby made an Infraction of the Peace between the Crowns were become guilty of an Insult and Attempt against his Catholick Majesty and that by settling a Plantation in that place they have posted themselves dansles Souverains le plus Interieur de ces Demaines de sa Majeste In the Soveraign and most Inward Territories of and belonging to his Spanish Majesty And as in case that the matter stood as it is represented and as the complaint doth import the blame thereof ought to be wholly and entirely imputed unto the charged upon the Governours and Directors of the Company erected for Trading to Africa and the Indies and no ways either in the Injury that is done or in the clamours and accusations which arise by and from it to affect his Britannick Majesty in his Justice Veracity and Honour so it would be both requisite and necessary on the foot of Righteousness as well as of Truth that full reparation should be made to his Catholick Majesty if the Fact of the Scots in planting on the Isthmus of Darien were disagreable to Royal and National Treaties and a forceable seisure in times of Amity and Peace of the Lands and Demains of that King Yet I hope it will not be accounted Rudeness or Insolence in me to say that it is both expected and demanded that none will discover and betray themselves to be persons of so little Prudence or Equity as upon the single credit and alone evidence of Memorials to submit unto and to suffer their being either surprised or wheedled or menaced and hectoâ—ed into a belief that the settling the aforesaid Colony in the place abovâ—â—mentioned is therefore Injurious and Criminal in the Scots and to be reckoned an Invasion upon the Sovereign Rights and the Lawful Dominions of the King of Spain meerly because it is alledged and affirmed by his Ministers and in his name to be so And I do reckon my self fully warranted in the requiring and exacting this of every man who desires to escape the censure and reproach of being Imprudent Partial and Iniquous in that it hath very often and upon frequent occasions been the custom and practice of States Princes and Potentates to remonstrate and complain of the proceedings of other Rulers Governours and Soveraigns
Possession of the Natives Nor is there so much reason or cause why the Spaniards should fear the meeting with any thing that may be uncivil or hurtful from the Scots as they had reason to apprehend and dread from the Indians in that the latter are not only a rude and barbarous People but their ancient inveterate implacable and mortal Enemies whereas the former are both a civil generous and Christian People trained up in all the measures of Humanity good Breeding Morality and Religion and governing themselves by the Laws of Revelation as well as of Nations and who withal have never been in War nor are desirous to have any Hostility with them Yea the Alliances between the Crowns of Great Britain and of Spain ought to obviate all Jealousie in the Spaniards of their having any thing that is either undecent or injurious offer'd unto them by the Scots who are Subjects under a Monarch that is in affinity with His Catholick Majesty Whereas thro' want of Leagues and Stipulations between the Spaniards and those Indians into whose Territories the Scots are receiv'd they had ground of being always and justly suspicious that such mischiefs would be done them as the power of those Natives could enable them to attempt and execute Further if the adjacency and nearness of the Scots Plantation unto the Spanish Colonies prove matter of offence unto the latter and of complaint against the former the fault thereof is wholly to be lodg'd upon the Spaniards and therefore the blame ought entirely to fall upon them Seeing whatsoever the Scots are come into the possession and occupation of they have a just and legal Right thereunto from the grant and consent of the Natives who were the undoubted and true Proprietors thereof whereas the whole which the Spaniards do there possess and all the Colonies which they have settled hath not only been done without the leave but against the will of the ancient and rightful Owners So that by reason of the badness of their Title which flows from Usurpation and is built upon their having unjustly invaded what belonged unto others the whole of a reasonable Accusation and of a just Complaint doth lie against them and their Plantations whereas the Title of the Scots proving legal and good thro' their having come to inhabit and settle with the allowance and upon the invitation of the Indians the nearness of their Colony to those of the Spaniards doth not make them or it obnoxious to any just and rational Expostulations or Remonstrances Nor is the case of the Spaniards made better because of their Colonies being establish'd long ago or the condition of the Scots render'd worse by reason of their having but lately begun to sit down and to plant in that the Title of the one is good from the first moment whereas no length of time can ever make the claim of the other justifiable For as all Lawyers do say and particularly Grotius That tempus in se nullam habet vim effectricem that a possession which is acquir'd unjustly at first can never be render'd just by a continuance in the long occupation of it So a Title unto a Place and a Right in a Settlement by the grant and with the consent of the true Proprietors is equally good just and valid in Law the first day as it will be after the having been inherited a Thousand Years Moreover there is not that nearness of the Calidonian Colony to the Plantations which the Spaniards have upon the Isthmus of Darien as some thro' ignorance of Maps and unacquaintedness with Journals may upon a general noise and clamour be inclin'd to imagine seeing none of the Settlements which the Spaniards have and whereof they are in the actual possession and occupation are within less distance than fifteen or sixteen Leagues of the Scots Plantation which is enough not only to silence the report and to put an end to the pretence of the adjacency between the Colonies of the one and the other but for the giving large bounds for determining between their Properties and Jurisdiction and for chalking out limits of division and separation betwixt what can any time resonably arise and come to be their several and respective Claims And as they who would extend their pretence of Right and Jurisdiction fifteen or sixteen Leagues beyond what they are actually possess'd of may as well enlarge it to a thousand so neither do the Titles of Princes unto their various and different Dominions and Territories depend upon the nearness unto or the remoteness of their Lands from each others but upon the legal Property which they have and their being either in the actual possession of them or of Countries Cities Towns or Places upon which they do depend or upon the retaining a claim by vertue of an hereditary Right which they have not renounced But they must not only be strangely unacquainted with Histories as well as with Maps but stand ignorant of what every Traveller can inform them who do not know that even in Europe there are Soveraign Jurisdictions and Principalities surrounded by and inclosed within the Dominions of other Princes whereof among many others Orange and Avignion are undeniable Instances Nor is it possible to be avoided but the Lands and Territories of all Neighbouring Princes whatsoever who do live upon Continents must be Contiguous in some one place or another And tho' the limits of some Princes Countries may in some places be divided from those of other Potentates by ridges of Mountains or by considerable Rivers yet for the most part they are no otherwise distinguished and separated than by a road a hedge a brook or by erected Pillars of wood or by stones which are set up here and there Finally that wherewith the Scots stand charged and whereof they are in this particular accused is no more than what is practised by all European Princes and States in most parts or the World where they have settled Colonies and Plantations and that without the Infraction of the bonds of Amity and Alliances between them or the being thought to trespass against the rules of Decency and Respect which the Rulers of Kingdoms and Republicks are accustomed to render to each other of which it were easy to assign many undeniable instances but I shall confine my self to a few 'T is sufficiently known that all along on the Coast of Africk and particularly on the River Gambe the English French and other Europeans have their settlements intermixed and contiguous without clamouring against or Impeaching of one an other on the score of Adjacency Nor is it to be denied but that as Ceuta Tangier and Mamora do lie in the bosom of the Empire of Morocco so that they have been possessed by and have belonged to different European Potentates without their complaining of one another upon that Motive Neither is it to be in the least contradicted but that the English and French have their several and respective Plantations on the Island of
not assume the Confidence to pronounce any thing positively in reference to the particular grounds and reasons of the Opinion and Judgment of his Majesty the Lords Justices and the Council about it only it may not only be conjectured but affirmed with Confidence that the forbidding all proceedings in that enterprize was upon Motives of State rather than of Justice and that it was done because of the Inconveniencies which at that Juncture might have ensued and not by reason of the illegality of it For as the Proposal was made at a time when we were in Confederacy with the Crown of Spain for the carrying on a War against a Great and Powerful Monarch and as the Spanish Dominions were the chief seats of the War and the Ports and Havens of Spain absolutely needful as well as extreamly useful for the management of our Commerce in the Mediteranean and Levant so the preserving of Spain firmly in the Alliance was upon many other accounts which I shall not enumerate indispensably necessary both for the upholding of the War and in order to the success of it in favour of the Allies in general and particularly of Great Britain So that upon whatsoever political Inducements that proposal was discountenanced and rejected yet I may venture to affirm that it was not upon the foot and motive of the Spaniards having a right and property in and a Soveraignty and Jurisdiction over the whole Isthmus of Darien For as that would have been an acting in direct opposition to the general Foundation and Principle which both the English and all European Nations proceed upon in their establishing of Colonies in the West-Indies and in Justification of the rightful and legal Dominion that they have over the Lands Territories Provinces Islands which they have acquired there Namely that no ones right in that part of the World doth extend beyond possession and occupation so it were to have debarred and shut out the English as well as all other Europeans not only from erecting new Colonies in those places of America where the Spaniards are in the possession and have the Dominion but from settling any New Plantations in such parts of the West-Indies where the Natives are the sole Soveraigns and Occupiers Which is a thing both so absurd in it self and so directly opposite to the Interest Prosperity and Honour of England that it were to entertain an opinion inconsistent with good Manners so much as once to imagine that either the King the Lords Justices or any English Ministers of State should be so weak and imprudent and so neglectful of the Welfare and Glory of Great Britain as either to fall into such a pernicious measure of themselves or to be dup'd into it by others Moreover to have been influenced to reject the foresaid Proposal upon the reasons and motives of the Spaniards having an Universal and a Sole Right in the Isthmus would have been to have acted in the highest way of Injustice to the Natives thro' the ejecting them out of their Property and Jurisdiction in and over those Lands and Territories whereof they are both the legal and rightful owners and the alone occupiers and possessors to a great extent of ground upon that Straight and thro' the vesting the Property and Dominion in the Spaniards who have no Title or Claim to a great part of those Territories either by conquest or the consent of the Indians Nor can any thing more disgraceful and unrighteous as well as undecent and unmannerly be conceived of his Majesty and of those that are in the Administration than that they should act upon an Inducement that would import a robbing of the rightful Proprietosr of their Inheritances and a deposing of hereditary and legal Governours from their Lordships and Jurisdictions to place and settle them in others to whom they do no ways appertain Finally should we suppose his Majesty and the Lords Justices to have Prohibited the foresaid English Merchants and Traders to settle upon the Isthmus of Darien because it would have been an encroachment upon the rights of the King of Spain we must be obliged to add that they therein acted incongruously to the measures of other Princes and civil Ministers who have been both encouraging and endeavouring the Planting of Colonies upon or near to that Isthmus with the consent of the Natives without the least respect had to the Claim and Title of his Catholick Majesty whereof having given an instance before I shall not here repeat it So that having represented and finished whatsoever I account needful to be said for Justifying the Scots Settling a Colony at Darien to be according to the Laws of Nations and agreeable to all the measures of Justice and Friendship and not to be an Usurpation upon the right of the King of Spain nor to interfer with any Alliances between his Britannick Majesties and the Catholick King and having vinvicated that Fact of theirs from all the exceptions which are made either against the lawfulness or the friendliness of it It will now be a piece of prudence as well as of decency to bespeak the favour and assistance of the Parliament and People of England for their being supported and protected in that undertaking Nor shall I so much endeavour to perswade and influence them thereunto upon the Motives of generosity and Kindness as upon the Inducements that they will find the doing it to be greatly for the advantage of the Crown and Subjects of England For as much might be expected to be done in behalf of the Scots by that powerful and opulent Nation upon the reason of their being not only Neighbours to one another upon the same Island and under the Soveraignty and Government of one and the same Monarch but because of the many Offices of Councel and Aid which they have since the Union of the two Crowns mutually render'd to one another and that the Kingdom of Scotland in particular hath espoused the concerns of England in a way of Singular Amity and with extraordinary fidelity and zeal whensoever they have seen them involved under difficulties and dangers so that which is now desired from the English towards the Scots is not near what the Ancestors of the former have render'd unto those of the latter heretofore In that besides their having had the Counties of Northumberland Cumberland and Westmorland several times granted and confirmed unto them to be held in Fee of the Crown of England in recompence for the Services and assistances which they had yielded unto the English in their distresses We are assured by an English Writer that it was provided for in a course of Law under the Reign of Edward the Confessor that the Scots should be held Denizons of England and enjoy the same privileges with themselves because of the Aid which they had render'd to that Kingdom against the Danes and Norwegians But I shall chuse to wave the laying the recollection and consideration of all or of any of these before
balance of the Trade of the whole Universe into their hands but render himself and his Successors the unquestionable Arbiters of all affairs and transactions within the limits of the European Dominions and give him the glory of saving all Europe from the Deluge and Inundation of a French Conquest Whereunto let me in the next place be allow'd to subjoin that in case Scotland should be able of it self to defend and maintain their Colony against the machinations and assaults of the Spaniards without the assistance and support of England as it is hoped they may that the English will not only lose the Honour and Thanks of it with all the Privileges and Advantages which thro' countenancing and aiding of them they might have been partakers of as well as have been secur'd of the perpetual Friendship of that Nation and upon all occasions experienc'd the happy effects of it so it can give no just offence to such of the Kingdom of England as are endow'd with Wisdom and Understanding to have it plainly laid before them that if Scotland find it self too weak to withstand the Forces of the Crown of Spain and of such as may joyn their Power with that of the Catholick King for dislodging of them and in the mean time find themselves abandon'd by England how that in such a case it is greatly to be fear'd that they may call in some Neighbouring Monarch or State to their Succour and Support tho' the doing it will infallibly be reckon'd and deservedly too a trespass against their Allegiance Fealty and Loyalty And the Scots being naturally a warm People too much verifying the Proverb that Scotorum ingenia sunt fervida which vulgarly goes of them they may the sooner be hurry'd into such an irregular and unlawful course by reflecting that since both the Nations came under one Soveraign they are both much less esteemed by the English and enjoy fewer Privileges in England than in times of Peace between the Crowns they did before Whereof the reason is obvious namely that England being the powerful and opulent Nation and having the King Resident among them they do thereby the more easily influence him to be kinder to them than to the Scots For tho' I hope that they will never be tempted to run into such a Method and do also heartily wish that no provocations may force them upon it yet whosoever will either consider the Nature and Temper of Mankind and make reflections upon Late as well as upon more Ancient Precedents may find matter of apprehension and jealousie administred unto them that it is so far from being impossible they should do so that it rather looks like a moral certainty that it will come to pass There being nothing more natural as well as usual than for Communities and Nations as well as for individual and particular Men when either unkindly treated by their Friends or distressed by their Enemies to seek for succour and relief wheresoever they can obtain it And to cite the Testimonies and Examples that do aver and confirm this would be both to transcribe a considerable part of the Histories of all Ages and to give the Detale and Memoirs of the behaviour of vast numbers of private Persons Nor doth it in such a case come much under Peoples consideration how far such a procedure will be accounted Criminal and the Authors of it held impeachable Interest in such circumstances out balancing Duty and present inconveniencies stifling Fears with respect to what may be future Nor is it unworthy of remark what Mr. Littleton Brother to this present Speaker broadly insinuates concerning Barbados when he as well as that whole Plantation thought themselves severely dealt with by the Government and Kingdom of England namely that it was to be dreaded least under such discouragements they should be tempted to run into Merthods that would be as irreconcilable to their Loyalty as they would be contrary to their Inclinations unless they were forc'd upon them And as it is firmly to be believ'd that the Dutch or any of the Northern Crowns if apply'd unto by the Scots and their aid crav'd would be ready to own and espouse their concern so it is to be apprehended and fear'd in more special manner least under such melancholy menacing and distressful circumstances they should not make their address unto and put themselves under the protection of France Seeing besides the agreeableness in temper and humour between the Scots and the French more than between any two Nations in Europe the old Affinity that was betwixt them and the benefits which redounded mutually to each of them by it are not wholly forgotten For as the Ancient Alliance of Scotland with France and the many brave Troops wherewith upon all occasions they supplyed the French were the unhappy means of the English losing all those Noble Provinces and vast Territories whereof they were once rightfully possessed in France so the Scots are upon every unkind carriage of England towards them but too apt to remember the Honours and opulent Fortunes which divers of them attained unto during their long and faithful league with the French Nor have they reason much to question but should they renew their old Confederacy with France and call for assistance from thence the whole Kingdom of Scotland would be soon reinstated there in all the ancient Privileges and Immunities which were enjoyed by them heretofore and not only such who are chiefly concerned in the business of Darien become liberally rewarded and recompenced for throwing themselves into the arms of the French but such as are of the chief and first Rank of their Nobility would be courted to accept General-Commands Mareschal-Staffs Ducal-Coronets and Annual Pensions answerable to those of Princes of the Blood which their Ancestors formerly had Nor ought it to be over-look'd how the Scots even since their Vnion with England under one and the same King have without the knowledge of His Britannick Majesty sought the Protection of France when they conceiv'd themselves in danger of being Invaded by England It being too well known to admit of contradiction that when King Charles I. was advised and influenc'd to make War upon them for their withstanding what they call'd Invasion upon Church and State how they apply'd themselves unto France for assistance inscribing their Petition and Memorial to Lewis XIII Au Roy. For which tho' they were charg'd both with Treachery and Rebellion by the Court Party yet that Act of the Scots was not so heinously resented by the English as to deserve to be taken notice of and upbraided at the Treaty at Rippon Nor will the Zeal or rather Biggotry of the present French King be of much signification for diverting them from begging his protection in case they see themselves likely to be ruin'd in their present design thro' their being assaulted by Spain and abandon'd by England As knowing that the State Wisdom of Lewis XIV will as much over-rule his warmth for the Faith
and of their several and respective Subjects when all that hath been offered attempted and done by those who have been thus applyed and addressed unto and complained of hath been Lawful Friendly Honourable and Just and only accounted inconvenient at the Season or held to administer ground of Jealousie and Fear that it might in the future be prejudicial unto such who were the Complainants and Remonstrants And as no Potentate or Court in the World hath oftener and more clamorously betook themselves unto this Method than they of Spain have done in reference unto and behalf of what they unreasonably challenge and would have others be so weak as to allow them a Right unto the West-Indies so they have commonly in the issue and event been made to understand that they had no Pleadable Valuable and Justifiable reasons grounds or causes for their Remonstrances and Complaints Whereof as the Histories of all Nations are full of Examples and Instances so our own are not barren and unprovided of them Unto which as I shall confine my self on the motive of the Brevity that this discourse is designed to be of so I shall only assign a few out of the many that might be enumerated Whereof the first shall be the Behaviour and Answer of Queen Elizabeth during the time of Amity with Spain and before there was any rupture between her and Philip the Second upon a complaint against one Captain Parker made unto her by the Spanish Minister who resided at her Court under a publick Character which I do the rather mention because it relates to something that fell out at Darien where the Scots having taken the freedom to settle and to establish a Plantation is made the ground of the Memorials presented lately to his Majesty by the Spanish Ambassador in the name of the Catholick King For Captain Parker having in the year 1565 Sailed from England to Darien and begun to manage a profitable Trade with the Natives the Spaniards who have been always Jealous of and offended at any other Europeans coming into and Trafficking in those parts of America came with Armed Ships against him and after having threatned to make prize of him and those that were with him unless he would immediately depart upon his refusal to do so they attempted it But Parker being a gallant man and being likewise assisted by the Natives he not only beat the Spaniards that assaulted him and took one of their Ships but also plundred a place called Castel Dolora for all which he was both commended and justified by the Queen notwithstanding the Complaints and Remonstrances of the King of Spain by his Ambassador Whereunto may be added that famous and remarkable transaction much about the same Season between Queen Elizabeth and Philip the Second in relation to Captain Drake who having in a time of Peace betwixt the two Crowns been seised by the Spaniards for Trading in the Bay of Mexico and who thereupon having been allowed by her Majesty to make himself reparation and satisfaction for the Wrong and Dishonour done to her as well as for the Loss and Injury which he had Sustained sailed to Boco Fero where being shewed the South Sea and also assisted by the Native Indians who had War with the Spaniards he took and plundred some rich Spanish Vessels at St. Lazarus de Chagra Of which Bernardine de Mendoza who was then Spanish Ambassador at the Court of England having by a Memorial which he presented to the Queen complained as a great Act of Depredation committed by Drake upon the Spaniards in the West Indies and thereupon demanded reparation of the Loss and Damage which his Masters Subjects had thereby undergone he was answered by the Queen almost in the very terms and directly to the purpose following Namely That as the Spaniards had drawn these Inconveniencies and Mischiefs upon themselves by their severe and unjust dealing with the English in their American Commerce and their Trade there with the Natives so she did not understand why either her Subjects or those of any other European Princes should be debarred from Traffick in the Indies Vnto which as she did not acknowledge the Spaniards to have any title by the donation of the Bishop of Rome so she knew no right they had to any places there besides those that they were in actual possession of Seeing their having touched only here and there upon those coasts given names to Rivers or Capes and possibly built a few Cottages were such insignificant things as could no ways entitle them to a Propriety further than they were actually settled and continued to inhabit And therefore that as all their claim unto other Parts Places and Countries in the West Indies was only Imaginary and Chimerical so it was thereupon Free for other Princes and States and their respective Subjects without the least Breach or Violation of the Laws of Nations both to Trade and Transplant Colonies into all such American Districts and Territories where the Spaniards did not inhabit And that as all pretence to a right to any Country there otherwise than as they were possessed of it is nothing but a vain and unjust Vsurpation which makes no foundation nor gives any right by and according to the laws of Nations for a limited and restrained claim in and over those Countries so it is as lawful for any other Nation as it is for Spain to Navigate that vast Ocean without being inhibited obstructed or therein Disturbed in that the use of the Sea and Air is common unto all and every people whatsoever neither Nature nor custom having given or allowed possession or Propriety thereof to any one particular Country of the World Preclusive of others But tho' this that I have here reported may very reasonably be counted enough to have been said under this head as being so full as well as pertinent for shewing how little reason and cause there may often be of Judging hastily conclusively and prejudically of the proceedings and Facts of the Subjects of any State or Soveraign meerly because of complaints exhibited in Memorials by the Ambassadours of other Princes stiling and representing what hath been done by them under the Characters of being violatious of the Laws of Nations Invasions upon the Territories and Jurisdictions of Potentates and Infractions of publick Treaties and Alliances yet I shall not reckon it either superfluous or impertinent nor will the reader I hope think it tedious to have one Instance more subjoyned that was of a parallel nature and to the same purpose and upon the same occasion which as it referreth to a Memorial of the same importance and kind with those that have been presented lately to his Majesty so it was one delivered into a King of great Britain by an Ambassadour of Spain in the name and in obedience to the Command of his Master Whereof the Story in brief is this Namely that in the year 1629. being after a Rupture and during the time of a War
between the Crown of Great Britain and of Spain divers of the English Nation finding the Islands of Cateline and Tortuga unpossessed and empty of Inhabitants did thereupon seize and begin to plant Colonies on them giving to the former the name of the Island of Providence and to the latter the name of the Island of Association And which they continuing to inhabit and occupy after the establishment of the Peace betwixt his Britannick Majesty and the Catholick King Anno 1630. the Spaniards became thereat offended not only because of its being an extending and an enlargement of English Settlements in America but by reason of the nearness of those Islands to the Spanish West-India Colonies particularly to those of Cuba and Hispaniola and accordingly complained thereof to King Charles the First by their Ambassador who tho' he was a Prince both of those Morals and Politicks that he would not countenance the least thing that was unjust and Illegal towards and against any and much less in relation to Soveraigns and Potentates with whom he was in Leagues and Alliances nevertheless he gave in Answer to the said Complaint that his Subjects having found those Islands both unpossessed by the Spaniards and uninhabited by any other people whatsoever had thereupon by the Laws of Nature as well as of Nations a Liberty and Right to sit down and to plant there And that they ought not to be therein Obstructed or hindred either because of Jealousies which the Spaniards might entertain on the foot of those Islands being so adjacent to their Territories or by reason of any apprehensions they might have that English Colonies there would prove afterwards inconvenient and prejudicial unto them In which Answer the Spaniards were so far forced to acquiesce at that time as not to reckon that Fact of his Britannick Majesty's Subjects to be any Infraction of Alliances or a Rupture of the Peace Tho' I must withall add that upon the arising of misunderstandings between King Charles the First and his People of England and upon his Subjects of Scotland running into Rebellion the Spaniards made those advantages of our quarrelling here at home among our selves as to assault the English in both the forementioned Islands and were therein so successful as first to drive them out of Tortuga Anno 1634. and afterwards out of Cateline Anno 1640. In the attempt whereof as they acted against all the measures of Law and Justice and to the highest degrees of cruelty and barbarity in the execution of it so it is too well known upon whom both the blame and Infamy are to be charged that those Invasions of the Spaniards upon the Rights Properties and Possessions of the English were not Revenged as they deserved and as they undoubtedly would have been had not King Charles been diverted and hinder'd from it by the unhappy differences which sprung up between him and his People Having then done what I hope will be judged sufficient to obviate and prevent all misconstructions and sinistrous thoughts which might otherwise have risen in the minds of any by reason of the late Memorial presented to his Majesty I do reckon that I have thereby paved my way towards an examination of the Fact of the Scots Company in their setling at Darien whether it ought to be accounted illegal and unjust contrary to the Laws of Nature and of Nations and to interfer with solemn Regal Stipulations or whether it may be esteemed Lawful Righteous and Agreeable to all the rules and measures of Wisdom Amity and Justice as that I may now apply and address my self directly and closely to it without finding the forementioned Remonstrances to remain an Impediment and obstruction in my way And as an Introduction thereunto I cannot but both acknowledge and commend the Fair Honourable and Friendly proceedure of the Catholick King in that he hath by Memorials given in to his Britannick Majesty chosen to assert his pretensions and rights in an Amicable way and so affords an opportunity that the whole World may be satisfied on the Foot and Topicks of Reason Custom and Law that neither the Act and Patent which the King of Great Britain hath granted to his Subjects in Scotland are any ways either disagreeable to Treaties with Spain or dissonant from the received Maxims of Equity and Justice by which States and Princes do govern themselves in their Publick and Political actions towards one and other Nor that the Scots Company have either exceeded the limits prescribed unto them in the Statute and Charter by which they are authorized to Trade to Africa and the Indies and to establish Colonies and Plantations there or that they have done any thing prejudicial unto and Invasive upon the Rights of Spain For hereby instead of putting the decision of this great and important affair upon the Strength Power and Success of Arms and the verdict that should result from Hostility and War it is placed on the amicable foundation of Reason Alliances and Laws and made adjudgeable in the Cabinets and at the Councel Boards of Princes and not immediately referred to a determination by Fleets and Armies on the Ocean and Continent And therefore that this matter may be set and represented in the best and clearest light for an amicable adjustment and composure of it between his Brittanick Majesty and the King of Spain I shall in order thereunto propose and lay down some things in the way of so many Premises which which shall carry that intrinsick certainty and evidence in them as to resemble and be of the Nature of Postulata in Mathematicks and which shall be found as undeniable principles in a discourse that is relative unto and concerning right of property in a Country as the other are acknowledged by all men to be in Geometry Whereof the first is this namely that the Original most Ancient and that which is by all Civilians confessed to be the ground and foundation of the uncontrovertible Title and Right of any people to this or that Country is their having been the Primitive Occupiers and Possessors of it Quod enim est Nullius per occupationem acquiritur ejus Dominium say all Civilians For while the greatest or any part of the World lay wholly Void and Vninhabited and for the Occupation whereof no formal Division had intervened and been agreed upon by those who emitted Colonies for the possessing and planting such and such parts of the Earth assigning to every one of those Colonies there several and respective partitions and districts in that case the right of Title unto and of Property in such a Country and place became primi possidentis his or theirs who were the first occupiers thereof 'T is taken for a dictate of Nature and is that which the Universal reason of Mankind conducted them unto in the first and separated division which was made of this habitable World so far as it was void and uninhabited Vt quod quisque occupasset id proprium haberet