NUMBER XIII.

Thursday, November 2, 1710.

longa eft injuria, longae

Ambages; fed fumma fequar faftigia reru

IT

rum.

T is a practice I have generally followed, to converse in equal freedom with the deferving men of both parties; and it was never without fome contempt, that I have observed persons wholly out of employment affect to do otherwife. I doubted, whether any man could owe so much to the fide he was of, although he were retained by it; but without fome great point of intereft, either in poffeffion or profpect, I thought it was the mark of a low and narrow spirit.

It is hard, that for fome weeks past I have been forced in my own defence to follow a proceeding, that I have so much condemned in others. But feveral of my acquaintance among the declining party are grown fo infufferably peevish and fplenetick, profess fuch. violent apprehenfions VOL. VIII.

B

for

for the publick, and represent the state of things in fuch formidable ideas, that I find myself disposed to share in their afflictions; although I know them to be groundless and imaginary, or, which is worse, purely affected. To offer them comfort one by one, would be not only an endless, but a difobliging task. Some of them, I am convinced, would be less melancholy if there were more occafion. I fhall therefore, inftead of hearkening to farther complaints, employ fome part of this paper for the future in letting fuch men fee, that their natural or acquired fears are ill-grounded, and their artificial ones as ill-intended; that all our present inconveniences are the confequence of the very counfels they fo much admire, which would ftill have encreased if thofe had continued; and that neither our conftitution in church or ftate could probably have been long preserved without fuch methods, as have been already taken.

THE late revolutions at court have given room to some specious objections, which I have heard repeated by well-meaning men,

just as they had taken them up on the credit of others, who have worfe defigns. They wonder, the QUEEN would chufe to change her ministry at this juncture, and thereby give uneafinefs to a general, who hath been fo long fuccefsful abroad, and might think himself injured, if the entire miniftry were not of his own nomination; that there were few complaints of any confequence against the late men in power, and none at all in parliament, which on the contrary paffed votes in favour of the chief minifter; that, if her majesty had. a mind to introduce the other party, it would have been more feasonable after a peace, which now we have made defperate by fpiriting the French, who rejoice at these changes, and by the fall of our credit, which unqualifies us for carrying on the war; that the parliament, fo untimely diffolved, had been diligent in their fupplies, and dutiful in their behaviour; that one confequence of thefe changes appears already in the fall of the ftocks; that we may foon expect more and worfe; and lastly, that all this naturally tends to break

the fettlement of the crown, and call over

the Pretender.

These, and the like notions, are plentifully scattered abroad by the malice of a ruined party, to render the QUEEN and her administration odious, and to inflame the nation. And these are what, upon occafion, I fhall endeavour to overthrow by discovering the falfhood and abfurdity of them.

It is a great unhappiness, when in a government conftituted like ours it should be fo brought about, that the continuance of a war muft be for the interest of vaft numbers (civil, as well as military) who otherwife would have been as unknown, as their original. I think our present condition of affairs is admirably defcribed by two verfes in Lucan:

Hinc ufura vorax, avidumque in tempore foenus,

Hinc concuffa fides, et multis utile bellum.

Which, without

any great force upon the words, may be thus tranflated:

Hence are derived thofe exorbitant interefts

and annuities; hence thofe large discounts for

advance