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The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria cover

The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. / From the Accession of George III. to the Twenty-Third Year of the Reign of Queen Victoria

Chapter 310: SENTIMENTS OF FOREIGN POWERS TOWARD ENGLAND.
By Edward Farr
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About This Book

The volume traces British political, parliamentary, and military developments from the accession of George III through the early nineteenth century, chronicling changes of ministry and cabinet, debates over colonial taxation and the American conflict, parliamentary controversies involving figures such as Wilkes and Warren Hastings, questions of Catholic relief and slave-trade abolition, and responses to the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars, including major naval and continental campaigns, the union with Ireland, and domestic legislation on finance, civil liberties, and parliamentary reform.

SENTIMENTS OF FOREIGN POWERS TOWARD ENGLAND.

The British cabinet were everywhere frustrated in their endeavours to gain friends and allies. After the failure of their negociations with Spain, they sought to purchase the friendship of the emperor Joseph II., by offering to him the navigation of the Scheldt, and other advantages, both commercial and political. Joseph, however, still retained all his ancient resentment against George III. and his ministers, and their overtures were unheeded. The offers of the British cabinet, indeed, appear to have been construed by him into a confession of weakness; for he even ordered his subjects to withdraw their money from the English funds, under the plea that a national bankruptcy was inevitable. Probably, the long and loud cry of the opposition, concerning the weakness and poverty of England, had reached his ears, which may have led him into the belief that such a consummation was at hand. It would have been well for Joseph’s honour had he stopped here. Although England was surrounded by enemies, and not a friend held forth a helping hand, he sought to arm the Empress of Russia against her; asserting, that as Great Britain had commenced hostilities against the Dutch, on account of the Armed Neutrality, she was called on to assist them by treaty. Joseph failed in his attempt to put the sword into the hands of the empress, but he diminished her attachment to the English, and increased her desire to extend that confederacy. As for Joseph himself, he now openly declared his accession to the Armed Neutrality, and thereby testified a desire for the triumph of the Americans, so that ministers plainly saw that they had nothing to hope from his mediation. This he continued to offer, while binding himself to the most active enemies of Great Britain; but “all was false and hollow.”