The hearts of the Patriots must have rejoiced when they heard such an argument from the lips of Walpole. For what did it amount to? Only this--that this un-English Minister, this unworthy servant of the crown, positively admitted into his own mind the idea that there was any possibility of England's being worsted in any war with {156} any state or any number of states! Fancy any one allowing such a thought to remain for an instant in his mind! As if it were not a settled thing, specially arranged by Providence, that one Englishman is a match for at least any six Spaniards, Frenchmen, or other contemptible foreigners! Walpole's great intellectual want was the lack of imagination. If he had possessed more imagination, he would have been not only a greater orator, but a greater debater. He would have seen more clearly the effect of an argument on men with minds and temperaments unlike his own. In this particular instance the appeal to what he would have considered cool common-sense was utterly damaging to him. Pulteney pounced on him at once. "From longer forbearance," he exclaimed, "we have everything to fear; from acting vigorously we have everything to hope." He admitted that a war with Spain was to be avoided, if it could be avoided with honor; but, he asked, "will it ever be the opinion of an English statesman that, in order to avoid inconvenience, we are to embrace a dishonor? Where is the brave man," he demanded, "who in a just cause will submissively lie down under insults? No!--in such a case he will do all that prudence and necessity dictate in order to procure satisfaction, and leave the rest to Providence." Pulteney spoke with undisguised contempt of the sensitive honor of the Spanish people. "I do not see," he declared--and this was meant as a keen personal thrust at Walpole--"how we can comply with the form of Spanish punctilio without sacrificing some of the essentials of British honor. Let gentlemen but consider whether our prince's and our country's honor is not as much engaged to revenge our injuries as the honor of the Spaniards can be to support their insolence." There never, probably, was a House of Commons so cool-headed and cautious as not to be stirred out of reason and into passion by so well-contrived an appeal. The appeal was followed up by others. "Perhaps," Sir William Wyndham said, "if we lose the character of being good fighters, we shall at least gain that {157} of being excellent negotiators." But he would not leave to Walpole the full benefit of even that doubtful change of character. "The character of a mere negotiator," he insisted, "had never been affected by England without her losing considerable, both in her interest at home and her influence abroad. This truth will appear plainly to any one who compares the figure this nation made in Europe under Queen Elizabeth with the figure she made under her successor, King James the First.