1st. That they made a scandalous peace, unjustly broke the alliance, betrayed the confederates, and sold us all to the French.
G.o.d forbid it should be all truth, in the manner that we see it in print; but that I say is none of my business. But what hand had I in all this? I never wrote one word for the peace before it was made, or to justify it after it was made; let them produce it if they can. Nay, in a Review upon that subject while it was making, I printed it in plainer words than other men durst speak it at that time, that I did not like the peace, nor did I like any peace that was making since that of the part.i.tion, and that the protestant interest was not taken care of either in that or the treaty of Gertrudenburgh before it.
It is true that I did say, that since the peace was made, and we could not help it, that it was our business and our duty to make the best of it, to make the utmost advantage of it by commerce, navigation, and all kind of improvement that we could, and this I say still; and I must think it is more our duty to do so than the exclamations against the thing itself, which it is not in our power to retrieve. This is all that the worst enemy I have can charge me with. After the peace was made, and the Dutch and the emperor stood out, I gave my opinion of what I foresaw would necessarily be the consequence of that difference, viz., that it would inevitably involve these nations in a war with one or other of them; any one who was master of common sense in the public affairs might see that the standing out of the Dutch could have no other event. For if the confederates had conquered the French, they would certainly have fallen upon us by way of resentment, and there was no doubt but the same councils that led us to make a peace would oblige us to maintain it, by preventing too great impressions upon the French.
On the other hand, I alleged, that should the French prevail against the Dutch, unless he stopped at such limitations of conquest as the treaty obliged him to do, we must have been under the same necessity to renew the war against France; and for this reason, seeing we had made a peace, we were obliged to bring the rest of the confederates into it, and to bring the French to give them all such terms as they ought to be satisfied with.
This way of arguing was either so little understood, or so much maligned, that I suffered innumerable reproaches in print for having written for a war with the Dutch, which was neither in the expression, nor ever in my imagination; but I pa.s.s by these injuries as small and trifling compared to others I suffer under.
However, one thing I must say of the peace, let it be good or ill in itself, I cannot but think we have all reason to rejoice in behalf of his present majesty, that at his accession to the crown he found the nation in peace, and had the hands of the king of France tied up by a peace so as not to be able, without the most infamous breach of articles, to offer the least disturbance to his taking a quiet and leisurely possession, or so much as to countenance those that would.
Not but that I believe, if the war had been at the height, we should have been able to have preserved the crown for his present majesty, its only rightful lord; but I will not say it should have been so easy, so bloodless, so undisputed as now; and all the difference must be acknowledged to the peace, and this is all the good I ever yet said of it.
I come next to the general clamour of the ministry being for the pretender. I must speak my sentiments solemnly and plainly, as I always did in that matter, viz., that if it was so, I did not see it, nor did I ever see reason to believe it; this I am sure of, that if it was so, I never took one step in that kind of service, nor did I ever hear one word spoken by any one of the ministry that I had the honour to know or converse with, that favoured the pretender; but have had the honour to hear them all protest that there was no design to oppose the succession of Hanover in the least.
It may be objected to me, that they might be in the interest of the pretender for all that; it is true they might, but that is nothing to me. I am not vindicating their conduct, but my own; as I never was employed in anything that way, so I do still protest I do not believe it was ever in their design, and I have many reasons to confirm my thoughts in that case, which are not material to the present case. But be that as it will, it is enough to me that I acted nothing in any such interest, neither did I ever sin against the protestant succession of Hanover in thought, word, or deed; and if the ministry did, I did not see it, or so much as suspect them of it.
It was a disaster to the ministry, to be driven to the necessity of taking that set of men by the hand, who n.o.body can deny, were in that interest; but as the former ministry answered, when they were charged with a design to overthrow the church, because they favoured, joined with, and were united to the dissenters; I say they answered, that they made use of the dissenters, but granted them nothing (which, by the way, was too true;) so these gentlemen answer, that it is true they made use of jacobites, but did nothing for them.
But this by the by. Necessity is pleaded by both parties for doing things which neither side can justify. I wish both sides would for ever avoid the necessity of doing evil; for certainly it is the worst plea in the world, and generally made use of for the worst things.
I have often lamented the disaster which I saw employing jacobites was to the late ministry, and certainly it gave the greatest handle to the enemies of the ministry to fix that universal reproach upon them of being in the interest of the pretender. But there was no medium. The whigs refused to show them a safe retreat, or to give them the least opportunity to take any other measures, but at the risk of their own destruction; and they ventured upon that course in hopes of being able to stand alone at last without help of either the one or the other; in which they were no doubt, mistaken.
However, in this part, as I was always a.s.sured, and have good reason still to believe, that her majesty was steady in the interest of the house of Hanover, and as nothing was ever offered to me, or required of me, to the prejudice of that interest, on what ground can I be reproached with the secret reserved designs of any, if they had such designs, as I still verily believe they had not?
I see there are some men who would fain persuade the world, that every man that was in the interest of the late ministry, or employed by the late government, or that served the late queen, was for the pretender.
G.o.d forbid this should be true; and I think there needs very little to be said in answer to it. I can answer for myself, that it is notoriously false; and I think the easy and uninterrupted accession of his majesty to the crown contradicts it. I see no end which such a suggestion aims at, but to leave an odium upon all that had any duty or regard to her late majesty.
A subject is not always master of his sovereign"s measures, nor always to examine what persons or parties the prince he serves employs, so be it that they break not in upon the const.i.tution; that they govern according to law, and that he is employed in no illegal act, or have nothing desired of him inconsistent with the liberties and laws of his country. If this be not right, then a servant of the king"s is in a worse case than a servant to any private person.
In all these things I have not erred; neither have I acted or done anything in the whole course of my life, either in the service of her majesty or of her ministry, that any one can say has the least deviation from the strictest regard to the protestant succession, and to the laws and liberties of my country.
I never saw an arbitrary action offered at, a law dispensed with, justice denied, or oppression set up, either by queen or ministry, in any branch of the administration, wherein I had the least concern.
If I have sinned against the whigs, it has been all negatively, viz., that I have not joined in the loud exclamations against the queen and against the ministry, and against their measures; and if this be my crime, my plea is twofold.
1. I did not really see cause for carrying their complaints to that violent degree.
2. Where I did see what, as before, I lamented and was sorry for, and could not join with or approve,--as joining with jacobites, the peace, &c.,--my obligation is my plea for my silence.
I have all the good thoughts of the person, and good wishes for the prosperity of my benefactor, that charity and that grat.i.tude can inspire me with. I ever believed him to have the true interest of the protestant religion and of his country in his view; and if it should be otherwise, I should be very sorry. And I must repeat it again, that he always left me so entirely to my own judgment, in everything I did, that he never prescribed to me what I should write, or should not write, in my life; neither did he ever concern himself to dictate to or restrain me in any kind; nor did he see any one tract that I ever wrote before it was printed; so that all the notion of my writing by his direction is as much a slander upon him as it is possible anything of that kind can be; and if I have written anything which is offensive, unjust, or untrue, I must do that justice as to declare, he has no hand in it; the crime is my own.
As the reproach of his directing me to write is a slander upon the person I am speaking of, so that of my receiving pensions and payments from him for writing, is a slander upon me; and I speak it with the greatest sincerity, seriousness, and solemnity that it is possible for a Christian man to speak, that except the appointment I mentioned before, which her majesty was pleased to make me formerly, and which I received during the time of my lord G.o.dolphin"s ministry, I have not received of the late lord treasurer, or of any one else by his order, knowledge, or direction, one farthing, or the value of a farthing, during his whole administration; nor has all the interest I have been supposed to have in his lordship been able to procure me the arrears due to me in the time of the other ministry. So help me G.o.d.
I am under no necessity of making this declaration. The services I did, and for which her majesty was pleased to make me a small allowance, are known to the greatest men in the present administration; and some of them were then of the opinion, and I hope are so still, that I was not unworthy of her majesty"s favour. The effect of those services, however small, is enjoyed by those great persons and by the whole nation to this day; and I had the honour once to be told, that they should never be forgotten. It is a misfortune that no man can avoid, to forfeit for his deference to the person and services of his queen, to whom he was inexpressibly obliged; and if I am fallen under the displeasure of the present government for anything I ever did in obedience to her majesty in the past, I may say it is my disaster; but I can never say it is my fault.
This brings me again to that other oppression which, as I said, I suffer under, and which, I think, is of a kind that no man ever suffered under so much as myself; and this is to have every libel, every pamphlet, be it ever so foolish, so malicious, so unmannerly, or so dangerous, be laid at my door, and be called publicly by my name. It has been in vain for me to struggle with this injury; it has been in vain for me to protest, to declare solemnly, nay, if I would have sworn that I had no hand in such a book or paper, never saw it, never read it, and the like, it was the same thing.
My name has been hackneyed about the street by the hawkers, and about the coffeehouses by the politicians, at such a rate as no patience could bear. One man will swear to the style; another to this or that expression; another to the way of printing; and all so positive that it is to no purpose to oppose it.
I published once, to stop this way of using me, that I would print nothing but what I set my name to, and held it for a year or two; but it was all one; I had the same treatment. I now have resolved for some time to write nothing at all, and yet I find it the same thing; two books lately published being called mine, for no other reason that I know of than that at the request of the printer, I revised two sheets of them at the press, and that they seemed to be written in favour of a certain person; which person, also, as I have been a.s.sured, had no hand in them, or any knowledge of them, till they were published in print.
This is a flail which I have no fence against, but to complain of the injustice of it, and that is but _the shortest way_ to be treated with more injustice.
There is a mighty charge against me for being author and publisher of a paper called the "Mercator." I will state the fact first, and then speak to the subject.
It is true, that being desired to give my opinion in the affair of the commerce with France, I did, as I often had done in print many years before, declare that it was my opinion we ought to have an open trade with France, because I did believe we might have the advantage by such a trade; and of this opinion I am still. What part I had in the Mercator is well known; and could men answer with argument, and not with personal abuse, I would at any time defend every part of the Mercator which was of my doing. But to say the Mercator was mine, is false; I neither was the author of it, had the property of it, the printing of it, or the profit by it. I had never any payment or reward for writing any part of it, nor had I the power to put what I would into it. Yet the whole clamour fell upon me, because they knew not who else to load with it.
And when they came to answer, the method was instead of argument, to threaten and reflect upon me, reproach me with private circ.u.mstances and misfortunes, and give language which no Christian ought to give, and which no gentleman ought to take.
I thought any Englishman had the liberty to speak his opinion in such things, for this had nothing to do with the public. The press was open to me as well as to others; and how or when I lost my English liberty of speaking my mind, I know not; neither how my speaking my opinion without fee or reward, could authorise them to call me villain, rascal, traitor, and such opprobrious names.
It was ever my opinion, and is so still, that were our wool kept from France, and our manufactures spread in France upon reasonable duties, all the improvements which the French have made in the woollen manufactures would decay, and in the end be little worth; and consequently, the hurt they could do us by them would be of little moment.
It was my opinion, and is so still, that the ninth article of the treaty of commerce was calculated for the advantage of our trade, let who will make it. That is nothing to me. My reasons are because it tied up the French to open the door to our manufactures at a certain duty of importation there, and left the parliament of Britain at liberty to shut theirs out by as high duties as they pleased here, there being no limitation upon us as to duties on French goods; but that other nations should pay the same.
While the French were thus bound, and the British free, I always thought we must be in a condition to trade to advantage, or it must be our own fault. This was my opinion, and is so still; and I would venture to maintain it against any man upon a public stage, before a jury of fifty merchants, and venture my life upon the cause, if I were a.s.sured of fair play in the dispute. But that it was my opinion that we might carry on a trade with France to our great advantage, and that we ought for that reason to trade with them, appears in the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth volumes of the Review, above nine years before the Mercator was thought of. It was not thought criminal to say so then; how it come to be villanous to say so now, G.o.d knows; I can give no account of it. I am still of the same opinion, and shall never be brought to say otherwise, unless I see the state of trade so altered as to alter my opinion; and if ever I do I shall be able to give good reasons for it.
The answer to these things, whether mine or no, was all pointed at me, and the arguments were generally in the terms villain, rascal, miscreant, liar, bankrupt, fellow, hireling, turncoat, &c. What the arguments were bettered by these methods, I leave others to judge of.
Also, most of those things in the Mercator, for which I had such usage, were such as I was not the author of.
I do grant, had all the books which had been called by my name been written by me, I must of necessity have exasperated every side; and perhaps have deserved it; but I have the greatest injustice imaginable in this treatment, as I have in the perverting the design of what I have really written.
To sum up, therefore, my complaint in a few words:--
I was, from my first entering into the knowledge of public matters, and have ever been to this day, a sincere lover of the const.i.tution of my country; zealous for liberty and the protestant interest; but a constant follower of moderate principles, a vigorous opposer of hot measures in all parties. I never once changed my opinion, my principles, or my party: and let what will be said of changing sides, this I maintain, that I never once deviated from the revolution principles, nor from the doctrine of liberty and property on which it was founded.
I own I could never be convinced of the great danger of the pretender in the time of the late ministry, nor can I be now convinced of the great danger of the church under this ministry. I believe the cry of the one was politically made use of then to serve other designs, and I plainly see the like use made of the other now. I spoke my mind freely then, and I have done the like now, in a small tract to that purpose not yet made public; and which if I live to publish I will publicly own, as I purpose to do everything I write, that my friends may know when I am abused, and they imposed on.
It has been the disaster of all parties in this nation to be very hot in their turn; and as often as they have been so I have differed with them, and ever must and shall do so. I will repeat some of the occasions on the whigs" side, because from that quarter the accusation of my turning about comes.
The first time I had the misfortune to differ with my friends was about the year 1683, when the Turks were besieging Vienna, and the whigs in England, generally speaking, were for the Turks taking it, which I, having read the history of the cruelty and perfidious dealings of the Turks in their wars, and how they had rooted out the name of the Christian religion in above threescore and ten kingdoms, could by no means agree with. And though then but a young man, and a younger author, I opposed it, and wrote against it, which was taken very unkindly indeed.
The next time I differed with my friends was when king James was wheedling the dissenters to take off the penal laws and test, which I could by no means come into. And, as in the first, I used to say, I had rather the popish house of Austria should ruin the protestants in Hungaria, than the infidel house of Ottoman should ruin both protestants and papists by overrunning Germany; so, in the other, I told the dissenters I had rather the church of England should pull our clothes off by fines and forfeitures, than the papists should fall both upon the church and the dissenters, and pull our skins off by fire and f.a.got.
The next difference I had with good men was about the scandalous practice of occasional conformity, in which I had the misfortune to make many honest men angry, rather because I had the better of the argument, than because they disliked what I said.
And now I have lived to see the dissenters themselves very quiet, if not very well pleased with an act of parliament to prevent it. Their friends indeed laid it on; they would be friends indeed if they would talk of taking it off again.
Again, I had a breach with honest men for their maltreating king William; of which I say nothing, because I think they are now opening their eyes, and making what amends they can to his memory.
The fifth difference I had with them was about the treaty of Part.i.tion, in which many honest men are mistaken, and in which I told them plainly then that they would at last end the war upon worse terms; and so it is my opinion they would have done, though, the treaty of Gertrudenburgh had taken place.
The sixth time I differed with them was when the old whigs fell upon the modern whigs, and when the duke of Marlborough and my lord G.o.dolphin were used by the Observator in a manner worse, I must confess, for the time it lasted, than ever they were used since; nay, though it were by Abel and the Examiner; but the success failed. In this dispute my lord G.o.dolphin did me the honour to tell me, I had served him and his grace also both faithfully and successfully. But his lordship is dead, and I have now no testimony of it but what is to be found in the Observator, where I am plentifully abused for being an enemy to my country, by acting in the interest of my lord G.o.dolphin and the duke of Marlborough.
What weatherc.o.c.k can turn with such tempers as these!
I am now on the seventh breach with them, and my crime now is, that I will not believe and say the same things of the queen and the late treasurer which I could not believe before of my lord G.o.dolphin and the duke of Marlborough, and which in truth I cannot believe, and therefore could not say it of either of them; and which, if I had believed, yet I ought not to have been the man that should have said it for the reasons aforesaid.