But it is not of very great importance to dwell longer upon the impropriety of this clause, which there is no possibility of putting in execution.  That the merchants will try every method of eluding a law so prejudicial to their interest, may be easily imagined, and a mind not very fruitful of evasions, will discover that this law may be eluded by a thousand artifices.  If the merchants are restrained from allowing men their wages beyond a certain sum, they will make contracts for the voyage, of which the time may very easily be computed, they may offer a reward for expedition and fidelity, they may pay a large sum by way of advance, they may allow the sailors part of the profits, or may offer money by a third hand.  To fix the price of any commodity, of which the quantity and the use may vary their proportions, is the most excessive degree of ignorance.  No man can determine the price of corn, unless he can regulate the harvest, and keep the number of the people for ever at a stand.

But let us suppose these methods as efficacious as their most sanguine vindicators are desirous of representing them, it does not yet appear that they are necessary, and to inflict hardships without necessity, is by no means the practice of either wisdom or benevolence.  To tyrannise and compel is the low pleasure of petty capacities, of narrow minds, swelled with the pride of uncontroulable authority, the wantonness of wretches who are insensible of the consequences of their own actions, and of whom candour may, perhaps, determine, that they are only cruel because they are stupid.  Let us not exalt into a precedent the most unjust and rigorous law of our predecessors, of which they themselves declared their repentance, or confessed the inefficacy, by never reviving it; let us rather endeavour to gain the sailors by lenity and moderation, and reconcile them to the service of the crown by real encouragements; for it is rational to imagine, that in proportion as men are disgusted by injuries, they will be won by kindness.

There is one expedient, sir, which deserves to be tried, and from which, at least, more success may be hoped than from cruelty, hunger, and persecution.  The ships that are now to be fitted out for service, are those of the first magnitude, which it is usual to bring back into the ports in winter.  Let us, therefore, promise to all seamen that shall voluntarily engage in them, besides the reward already proposed, a discharge from the service at the end of six or seven months.  By this they will be released from their present dread of perpetual slavery, and be certain, as they are when in the service of the merchants, of a respite from their fatigues.  The trade of the nation will be only interrupted for a time, and may be carried on in the winter months, and large sums will be saved by dismissing the seamen when they cannot be employed.

By adding this to the other methods of encouragement, and throwing aside all rigorous and oppressive schemes, the navy may easily be manned, our country protected, our commerce reestablished, and our enemies subdued; but to pass the bill as it now stands, is to determine that trade shall cease, and that no ship shall sail out of the river.