Bradshaw will be civil enough to give her away, with an honest, artless smile of approbation.

LETTER XXI.

TO THE PRINTER OF THE PUBLIC ADVERTISER.

SIR, April 23, 1768. IF I were to characterize the present ministry from any single virtue which shines predominant in their administration, I should fix upon duplicity as the proper word to express it.

I would not here be misunderstood: I do not by this mean only the little sneaking quality, commonly called doubledealing, which every pettifogging rascal may attain to, but that real duplicity of character which our ministers have assumed to themselves, by which every member of their body acts in two distinct capacities, and, Janus-like, bears two faces and two tongues, either of which may give the lie to the other without danger to his reputation.

This is the present catholic political faith, which, unless a man believes, he shall not get a place; and if people would attend to this, they would be able to account for many of our great men's actions, which are unaccountable any other way.

By this rule a man may say as a judge that the loss of an Englishman's liberty for twenty-four hours only is grievous beyond estimation; and then as a minister may declare, that forty days' tyranny is a trifling burthen, which any Englishman may bear*.

As a member of parliament, a man may give his word that a certain bill shall be dropped; and the next day, as a chancellor of the exchequer, may bring it into the house. A first lord of the treasury may declare upon his honour that he has no concern in India stock; but there is nothing in this to hinder him as a private man from having a share with any young lady of virtue to the amount of 20,000l.

In those cases, you see, the duplicity of character in which

question, but Miss Wrottesley, niece to the Duchess of Bedford. See Junius, Letter 12, vol. i. p. 153.

In allusion to Lord Camden's opinion upon the power of the Crown to suspend an Act of Parliament. See the subject further discussed in Junius Letter 60, vol. i. p. 471.

they act covers the parties from all sort of blame; but I will now do honour to the noble Duke, who, from under the footstool of gouty legs*, has crept into the elbow chair, who, though green in years, is ripe in devices. It is he who has carried this double-faced virtue to its greatest pitch. He has not only practised it with great success in public affairs, but has also lately introduced it into dealings between man and

man.

66

The

Everybody knows the story of nullum tempus, and the application of it to rob the Duke of Portland of 30,000l. Duke of Grafton (as set forth in a case lately published) upon a representation, before any proceedings were had in the affair, did actually promise to the Duke of Portland, That no step should be taken towards the decision of the matter in question till his Grace's title should be stated, referred to, and reported on by the proper officer, and fully and maturely con sidered by the board of treasury." Had the Duke of Portland been fully apprised of the new doctrine of the twofold state of ministers, he would have considered this promise (as it was really meant) as illusory, and only an expedient to lull him asleep while the business was going on. But his Grace knew no more of this maxim than if he had been an India director, and thought that a promise was a promise in whatever character it was given; so while he, in full confidence, was preparing the proofs of his right, the affair in dispute was given away, and the new grant to Sir James Lowther made out, signed and sealed in the treasury, without ever his Grace's title being stated, referred to, or reported on, by the proper officer, or fully and maturely considered by the board."

Lest any one should think that I partially ascribe this conduct of the Duke of Grafton to my favourite principle of two natures, when it ought to be laid to some other of his Grace's virtues, I shall here quote a reply to the Duke of Portland's case, lately published (as it is said) under the auspices of the treasury, where this doctrine is defended with equal modesty and truth. The writer begins by admitting the promise, which he says was inadvertently given by the Duke of Grafton; but then, says he, "since he was the king's servant, and had no title to the making this promise, he perceived he was

Lord Chatham's.

not in honour bound to adhere to it." Now here is a fair distinction between the king's servant and the man of honour, a distinction which, I believe, few people at present are disposed to deny. His Grace (who has undoubtedly very delicate perceptions) perceived that as a king's minister he was not bound to keep a promise which he had made as a private man; and in this (continues the pamphleteer) "he can be supported by the soundest casuists.' I am not deeply read in authors of that professed title, but I remember seeing Busenbaum, Suarez, Molina, and a score of other Jesuitical books, burnt at Paris for their sound casuistry by the hands of the common hangman*. I do not know that they have yet found

* All kinds of strange conclusions have been drawn from the above sentence relative to the burning of the Jesuits' books, in reference to who were likely to have been present as spectators of the conflagration. A decree of the Parliament of Paris, dated August 6, 1761, had ordered that certain books by Jesuits should be burnt, in the palace yard at the foot of the great staircase, by the common hangman, "as seditious, destructive of every principle of Christian morality, teaching a murderous and abominable doctrine, not only against the safety of the lives of the subjects, but also against that of the sacred persons of sovereigns." The works condemned were chiefly those of Busenbaum and his commentator Lacroix. The decree was executed August 7, 1761. There had been previous burnings of the books of Busenbaum, namely, in 1757 and 1758, and there may have been others later than that of 1761. It follows that if Bifrons was Junius, Junius was in Paris at this date; and if Sir Philip Francis was Junius, Francis was in Paris. But Francis is not known to have been in Paris that year; he is known to have been with Lord Kinnoul at Lisbon, from which city he returned to England in October. Therefore, according to Mr. Coventry, who first raised the objection, and was followed by Mr. Barker with other anti-Franciscans, Sir Philip Francis could not have been Junius. But the superstructure falls to the ground at once by removing the founda

tion.

Is there any evidence that Bifrons was Junius? We believe none; nor has Mr. Good adduced any. Junius himself has nowhere said that he ever witnessed a burning of books in Paris. Bifrons' epistle has no signs of Junius; it is loose in style, desultory and unconnected, and has nothing in common with that great writer, excepting his dislike to the Duke of Grafton. It may be doubted, indeed, whether Bifrons was an Englishman, or even an Irishman; he certainly could not have been a British subject in 1761, unless he was a prisoner of war, for in that year we were at hot war with France. But if a prisoner of war, how unlikely that he could be at Paris to witness an auto da fé of heretical books; he would have been confined in the interior of the kingdom, not left at large to indulge his curiosity in the capital. Unquestionably Bifrons is spurious.

Mr Bohn, the publisher of the present volume, furnishes the following biblio

their way to England, unless perchance it be to the library of his Grace of Grafton, where they probably stand with the chapter of promises dog-eared down for the perusal of scrupulous statesmen.

This doctrine, once fully established, will add a great facility to business, and prevent unnecessary delays; for example, in former times a minister would have been exceedingly hampered with such a promise as we have here cited: he would have shifted, and delayed, and played the back-game to have got rid of it, or to reconcile the breach to his conscience and reputation; but here you see there was no unnecessary delay: the business went on; and he who acknowledged that he had given his word in a private capacity, brings the book to prove that as a first lord of the treasury "he was not bound to adhere to it,"—and this is sound casuistry. Thus a man who is dexterous in state legerdemain may play his two characters like cups and balls; speak, write, read, lie, promise, swear, and you can never catch him till the box drop out of his hand.

I proposed to have made this a complete panegyric on the Duke of Grafton; but I find it extremely difficult to draw one character of a man that acts in two. If, however, my poor attempt towards it should find favour in his sight, I hope he graphical account of these three Jesuits and their books:-Busenbaum's work, entitled "Medulla Theologiæ Moralis," was formerly a text book with the Jesuits, and so popular that it underwent more than fifty editions in less than half a century. It was first published about 1640, in a small duodecimo, and in 1757 was amplified to two bulky folios by Claude Lacroix. This latter edition specially advocated the authority of the Pope, even over the person of kings, and promulgated some doctrines concerning homicide and regicide which were just then particularly obnoxious to Louis XV., on account of the recent attempt on his life by Damien.

In consequence the book was ordered to be publicly burnt, first at Toulouse in 1707, and then at Paris in 1761. Subsequent to this period there are no burnings on record. With respect to Suarez, one of the most learned of the Jesuits, we find no evidence of any of his works having been publicly burnt since 1614. At that date his "Defensio Fidei Catholici contra Anglicanæ sectæ errores was officially burnt at Sens, as it had previously been, by order of James I., in London.

Molina died in 1660. His work on "Grace and Freewill," published at Lisbon 1588-9, gave rise to the celebrated congregation De Auxiliis, instituted in 1597 by Clement VIII.; but all agitation excited by his writings had ceased long before 1761, nor is there any reason to believe that they wer at any time publicly burnt either at Paris or elsewhere.-LD.

will on a future occasion afford me the means of distinguishing between his two characters, as Moliere's Sosia does between the two Amphitrions, "c'est l'Amphitrion chez qui l'on dine'

BIFRONS.

LETTER XXII.

TO THE PRINTER OF THE PUBLIC ADVERTISER.

Nil admirari.-HOR.

May 6, 1768.

SIR, WHEN the advocates of the ministry assure us that there never was a set of men more careful of the happiness of his Majesty's subjects I presume it is Horace's sense of happiness which they would be understood to promote. If it be their design to reduce us to a state of resignation in which we shall wonder at nothing they do, their bitterest enemies must confess that their endeavours to make us happy have been no less indefatigable than ingenious. By a regular progression from surprise to wonder, from wonder to astonishment, and so on through all the forms of admiration, they have at last conducted us to that philosophical state of repose which may set even the miracles of the present ministry at defiance. the force of example, beyond all ethics, had not made me as callous as a shoeing-horn, the contents of Saturday night's Gazette would, I confess, have made me stare. When his Majesty (God bless him!) is in perfect health, to be informed that the first session of a new parliament is to be opened by commission, is a novelty which, had I been less confirmed in my principles than I am, would, I own, have filled me with a certain portion of amazement* That the minister himself

If

*From the London Gazette.-Whitehall, April 30. It being His Majesty's royal intention that the parliament which is summoned to meet on Tuesday, the 10th day of May next, should then meet and sit, the King has been pleased to direct a commission to pass the great seal, appointing and authorizing his royal highness the Duke of Gloucester, his royal highness the Duke of Cumberland, Thomas, Lord Archbishop of Canterbury, and other lords, to open and hold the said parliament on the said 10th day of May next, being the day of the return of the writs of summons