Benjamin Franklin [1760 
a nation was ever blessed with; happy, too, in the 
wisdom and vigor of every part of the administra- 
tion, we cannot, we ought not to promise ourselves 
the uninterrupted continuance of those blessings. 
The safety of a considerable part of the state, 
and the interest of the whole, are not to be trusted 
to the wisdom and vigor of future administra- 
tions, when a security is to be had more effectual, 
more constant, and much less expensive. They who 
can be moved by the apprehension of dangers so 
remote, as that of the future independence of our 
colonies (a point I shall hereafter consider), seem 
scarcely consistent with themselves, when they sup- 
pose we may rely on the wisdom and vigor of an 
administration for their safety. I should indeed 
think it less material whether Canada were ceded to 
us or not, if I had in view only the security of pos- 
session in our colonies. I entirely agree with the 
Remarker, that we are in North America, “a far 
greater continental as well as naval power,” and 
that only cowardice or ignorance can subject our 
colonies there to a French conquest. But, for the 
same reason, I disagree with him widely upon an- 
other point. 
3. The Blood and Treasure spent in the American 
Wars, not spent in the Cause of the Colonies 
alone. 
I do not think that our “blood and treasure have 
been expended,” as he intimates, “in the cause of 
the colonies,” and that we are “making conquests 
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