This page has been validated.
INTRODUCTION.
iii.
servation is drawn from history, and needs no philosophical enquiries to establish it. But most certainly the English nation made those prodigious acquisitions of trade, within half a century after the death of Cromwell, that prepared the way for still greater increase. During the supine reigns of Charles II. and James II. we were gaining on our neighbours[1].
The
- ↑ Here our author gives a proof of his politeness, as in the last note he did of his understanding. "During the supine reigns of Charles and James the IId. (says he) we were gaining on our neighbours." Others would have insolently told a reader what, and how, we were gaining upon our neighbours; but our author genteely supposes every body has sense enough to find that out, and therefore does not tell us a single word of the matter. The historian too has happily introduced the completest opposition of words and ideas that could possibly have been hit upon. In the supine reigns we were gaining upon our neighbours; that is, we were doing something, when, in reality, we
were
