In a few weeks thirty thousand veterans, accustomed to conquer, and led by able and experienced captains, might cross from the ports of Normandy and Brittany to our shores.

That such a force would with little difficulty scatter three times that number of militia, no man well acquainted with war could doubt.

There must then be regular soldiers; and, if there were to be regular soldiers, it must be indispensable, both to their efficiency, and to the security of every other class, that they should be kept under a strict discipline.

An ill disciplined army has ever been a more costly and a more licentious militia, impotent against a foreign enemy, and formidable only to the country which it is paid to defend.

A strong line of demarcation must therefore be drawn between the soldiers and the rest of the community.