Editor’s NoteEditor’s Note1014To Charles Long13 October 1794 (Aet 46)

Hendon, Middlesex, October 13th, 1794.

Sir,

If the pecuniary resource I ventured t'other day to submit to you,² should be deemed ineligible or impracticable, perhaps in some other instance I may be more fortunate. I have two other such resources upon the anvil,—the one involving a burthen indeed, but pg 93that burthen coupled with an indemnity capable of balancing it, and sooner or later even of outweighing it: the other absolutely pure from all burthen from the very beginning. The first is already with the copyist: the principle of it has been exemplified in the first instance upon a single denomination of persons: but it is a pregnant one, and if approved may yield a score or two of other taxes. The other has been already travelled through, and wants only to be digested a little. Neither will trespass so much upon your patience, in point of quantity of reading, as the proposal about escheat: both together will not equal it in produce. Proposing without justifying is nothing: I could not bring myself to hazard either proposal, till I had, to my own conception, established it upon principles. Resources new in specie are hardly to be found; but it will be something if any such as are justly approved in specie can be rendered new in point of extent, or any that have undergone unmerited disgrace can be restored to favour and to practice by being placed in a new light.

Thus occupied, I have thought it an escape not to have received a summons as yet about my own particular business: it has been laid upon the shelf for the chance, faint as it may be, of being of use by your assistance in a line of superior importance. I would, therefore, beg the favour of you to allow me two clear days notice: for it will take me one day to abridge the memorial, and another to get it copied.³

On the former occasion I trespassed on the gravity of your situation by the present of a riddle. Permit me now to reconduct you to the style of the subject by a grave apophthegm,—Supply without burthen is victory without blood. The application of it is what I have been pushing as far as time and faculties would carry me.

If either use or amusement should, on your part, have paid for the trouble of reading all this, mine in writing it will have been overpaid.—I have the honour to be, with all respect, dear sir, your most obedient and humble servant.