_Dos est magna parentium virtus._[3]
I took up a paper[4] some days ago in a coffee-house; and if the
correctness of the style, and a superior spirit in it, had not
immediately undeceived me, I should have been apt to imagine, I had been
reading an "Examiner." In this paper, there were several important
propositions advanced. For instance, that "Providence raised up Mr.
H[arle]y to be an instrument of great good, in a very critical juncture,
when it was much wanted." That, "his very enemies acknowledge his eminent
abilities, and distinguishing merit, by their unwearied and restless
endeavours against his person and reputation": That "they have had
an inveterate malice against both": That he "has been wonderfully
preserved from _some_ unparalleled attempts"; with more to the same
purpose. I immediately computed by rules of arithmetic, that in the last
cited words there was something more intended than the attempt of
Guiscard, which I think can properly pass but for _one_ of the "some."
And, though I dare not pretend to guess the author's meaning; yet the
expression allows such a latitude, that I would venture to hold a wager,
most readers, both Whig and Tory, have agreed with me, that this plural
number must, in all probability, among other facts, take in the business
of Gregg.[5]
See now the difference of styles. Had I been to have told my thoughts on
this occasion; instead of saying how Mr. H[arle]y was "treated by some
persons," and "preserved from some unparalleled attempts"; I should with
intolerable bluntness and ill manners, have told a formal story, of a
com[mitt]ee[6] sent to a condemned criminal in Newgate, to bribe him with
a pardon, on condition he would swear high treason against his master,
who discovered his correspondence, and secured his person, when a certain
grave politician had given him warning to make his escape: and by this
means I should have drawn a whole swarm of hedge-writers to exhaust their
catalogue of scurrilities against me as a liar, and a slanderer. But with
submission to the author of that forementioned paper, I think he has
carried that expression to the utmost it will bear: for after all this
noise, I know of but two "attempts" against Mr. H[arle]y, that can really
be called "unparalleled," which are those aforesaid of Gregg and
Guiscard; and as to the rest, I will engage to parallel them from the
story of Catiline, and others I could produce.
However, I cannot but observe, with infinite pleasure, that a great part
of what I have charged upon the late prevailing faction, and for
affirming which, I have been adorned with so many decent epithets, hath
been sufficiently confirmed at several times, by the resolutions of one
or the other House of Parliament.[7] I may therefore now say, I hope,
with good authority, that there have been "some unparalleled attempts"
against Mr. Harley. That the late ministry were justly to blame in some
management, which occasioned the unfortunate battle of Almanza,[8] and
the disappointment at Toulon.[9] That the public has been grievously
wronged by most notorious frauds, during the Whig administration. That
those who advised the bringing in the Palatines,[10] were enemies to the
kingdom. That the late managers of the revenue have not duly passed their
accounts,[11] for a great part of thirty-five millions, and ought not to
be trusted in such employments any more. Perhaps in a little time, I may
venture to affirm some other paradoxes of this kind, and produce the same
vouchers. And perhaps also, if it had not been so busy a period, instead
of one "Examiner," the late ministry might have had above four hundred,
each of whose little fingers would be heavier than my loins. It makes me
think of Neptune's threat to the winds:
_Quos ego--sed motos praestat componere fluctus._[12]
Thus when these sons of Aeolus, had almost sunk the ship with the
tempests they raised, it was necessary to smooth the ocean, and secure
the vessel, instead of pursuing the offenders.
But I observe the general expectation at present, instead of dwelling any
longer upon conjectures who is to be punished for past miscarriages,
seems bent upon the rewards intended to those, who have been so highly
instrumental in rescuing our constitution from its late dangers. It is
the observation of Tacitus, in the life of Agricola, that his eminent
services had raised a general opinion of his being designed, by the
emperor, for praetor of Britain. _Nullis in hoc suis sermonibus, sed quia
par videbatur:_ and then he adds, _Non semper errat fama, aliquando et
eligit._[13] The judgment of a wise prince, and the general disposition
of the people, do often point at the same person; and sometimes the
popular wishes, do even foretell the reward intended for some superior
merit. Thus among several deserving persons, there are two,[14] whom the
public vogue hath in a peculiar manner singled out, as designed very soon
to receive the choicest marks of the royal favour. One of them to be
placed in a very high station, and both to increase the number of our
nobility. This, I say, is the general conjecture; for I pretend to none,
nor will be chargeable if it be not fulfilled; since it is enough for
their honour, that the nation thinks them worthy of the greatest rewards.
Upon this occasion I cannot but take notice, that of all the heresies in
politics, profusely scattered by the partisans of the late
administration, none ever displeased me more, or seemed to have more
dangerous consequences to monarchy, than that pernicious talent so much
affected, of discovering a contempt for birth, family, and ancient
nobility. All the threadbare topics of poets and orators were displayed
to discover to us, that merit and virtue were the only nobility; and that
the advantages of blood, could not make a knave or a fool either honest
or wise. Most popular commotions we read of in histories of Greece and
Rome, took their rise from unjust quarrels to the nobles; and in the
latter, the plebeians' encroachments on the patricians, were the first
cause of their ruin.
Suppose there be nothing but opinion in the difference of blood; every
body knows, that authority is very much founded on opinion. But surely,
that difference is not wholly imaginary. The advantages of a liberal
education, of choosing the best companions to converse with; not being
under the necessity of practising little mean tricks by a scanty
allowance; the enlarging of thought, and acquiring the knowledge of men
and things by travel; the example of ancestors inciting to great and good
actions. These are usually some of the opportunities, that fall in the
way of those who are born, of what we call the better families; and
allowing genius to be equal in them and the vulgar, the odds are clearly
on their side. Nay, we may observe in some, who by the appearance of
merit, or favour of fortune, have risen to great stations, from an
obscure birth, that they have still retained some sordid vices of their
parentage or education, either insatiable avarice, or ignominious
falsehood and corruption.
To say the truth, the great neglect of education, in several noble
families, whose sons are suffered to pass the most improvable seasons of
their youth, in vice and idleness, have too much lessened their
reputation; but even this misfortune we owe, among all the rest, to that
Whiggish practice of reviling the Universities, under the pretence of
their instilling pedantry, narrow principles, and high-church doctrines.
I would not be thought to undervalue merit and virtue, wherever they are
to be found; but will allow them capable of the highest dignities in a
state, when they are in a very great degree of eminence. A pearl holds
its value though it be found in a dunghill; but however, that is not the
most probable place to search for it. Nay, I will go farther, and admit,
that a man of quality without merit, is just so much the worse for his
quality; which at once sets his vices in a more public view, and
reproaches him for them. But on the other side, I doubt, those who are
always undervaluing the advantages of birth, and celebrating personal
merit, have principally an eye to their own, which they are fully
satisfied with, and which nobody will dispute with them about; whereas
they cannot, without impudence and folly, pretend to be nobly born:
because this is a secret too easily discovered: for no men's parentage is
so nicely inquired into, as that of assuming upstarts; especially when
they affect to make it better than it is, as they often do, or behave
themselves with insolence.
But whatever may be the opinion of others upon this subject, whose
philosophical scorn for blood and families, reaches even to those that
are royal, or perhaps took its rise from a Whiggish contempt of the
latter; I am pleased to find two such instances of extraordinary merit,
as I have mentioned, joined with ancient and honourable birth, which
whether it be of real or imaginary value, hath been held in veneration by
all wise, polite states, both ancient and modern. And, as much a foppery,
as men pretend to think it, nothing is more observable in those who rise
to great place or wealth, from mean originals, than their mighty
solicitude to convince the world that they are not so low as is commonly
believed. They are glad to find it made out by some strained genealogy,
that they have some remote alliance with better families. Cromwell
himself was pleased with the impudence of a flatterer, who undertook to
prove him descended from a branch of the royal stem. I know a
citizen,[15] who adds or alters a letter in his name with every plum he
acquires: he now wants but the change of a vowel, to be allied to a
sovereign prince in Italy; and that perhaps he may contrive to be done,
by a _mistake_ of the graver upon his tombstone.
When I am upon this subject of nobility, I am sorry for the occasion
given me, to mention the loss of a person who was so great an ornament to
it, as the late lord president;[16] who began early to distinguish
himself in the public service, and passed through the highest employments
of state, in the most difficult times, with great abilities and untainted
honour. As he was of a good old age, his principles of religion and
loyalty had received no mixture from late infusions, but were instilled
into him by his illustrious father, and other noble spirits, who had
exposed their lives and fortunes for the royal martyr.
----_Pulcherrima proles,
Magnanimi heroes nati melioribus annis._[17]
His first great action was, like Scipio, to defend his father,[18] when
oppressed by numbers; and his filial piety was not only rewarded with
long life, but with a son, who upon the like occasion, would have shewn
the same resolution. No man ever preserved his dignity better when he was
out of power, nor shewed more affability while he was in. To conclude:
his character (which I do not here pretend to draw) is such, as his
nearest friends may safely trust to the most impartial pen; nor wants the
least of that allowance which, they say, is required for those who are
dead.
[Footnote 1: No. 40 in the reprint. [T.S.]]
[Footnote 2: Writing to Stella, May 14th, 1711, Swift informs her: "Dr.
Freind was with me, and pulled out a twopenny pamphlet just published
called 'The State of Wit,' giving a character of all the papers that have
come out of late. The author seems to be a Whig, yet he speaks very
highly of a paper called 'The Examiner,' and says the supposed author of
it is Dr. Swift" (vol. ii., p. 176, of present edition). [T.S.]]
[Footnote 3: Horace, "Odes," III. xxiv. 21.
"The lovers there for dowry claim
The father's virtue, and the mother's fame."
P. FRANCIS.
[T.S.]]
[Footnote 4: "The Congratulatory Speech of William Bromley, Esq., ...
together with the Chancellor of the Exchequer's Answer."--See also No.
42, _post_, pp. 273-4. [T.S.]]
[Footnote 5: See No. 33, _ante_, pp. 207-14. [T.S.]]
[Footnote 6: The writer of "A Letter to the Seven Lords" says this means
"that there was a committee of seven lords, sent to a condemned criminal
in Newgate, to bribe him with a pardon, on condition he would swear high
treason, against his master."
In Hoffman's "Secret Transactions" (pp. 14, 15) the matter is thus
referred to: "Who those persons were that offered Gregg his life, with
great preferments and advantages (if he would but accuse his master) may
not uneasily be guessed at, for most of the time he was locked up none
but people of note, were permitted to come near him, who made him strange
promises, and often repeated them." [T.S.]]
[Footnote 7: "He does, with his own impudence, and with the malice of a
devil, bring in both Houses of P---- to say and mean the same thing....
It is matter of wonder ... to see the greatest ministers of state we ever
had (till now) treated by a poor paper-pedlar, every Thursday, like the
veriest rascals in the kingdom.... I could, if it were needful, bring a
great many instances, of this licentious way of the scum of mankind's
treating the greatest peers in the nation" ("A Letter to the Seven
Lords"). [T.S.]]
[Footnote 8: The Earl of Galway was defeated by the Duke of Berwick at
this battle on April 25th, 1707. [T.S.]]
[Footnote 9: The Allies, under the Duke of Savoy, unsuccessfully laid
siege to Toulon from July 26th to August 21st, 1707. [T.S.]]
[Footnote 10: The Palatines, who were mostly Lutherans, came over to
England in great numbers in May and June of 1709. So large was the
immigration that the House of Commons, on April 14th, 1711, passed a
resolution declaring that the inviting and bringing over of the Palatines
"at the public expense, was an extravagant and unreasonable charge to the
kingdom, and a scandalous misapplication of the public money." Whoever
advised it, said the resolution, "was an enemy to the Queen and this
kingdom." [T.S.]]
[Footnote 11: A Committee, appointed January 13th, 1710/1, reported in
April, 1711, that accounts for _£_35,302,107 18_s._ 9-5/8_d._(_sic_) had
not been passed. On February 21st, 1711/2, the auditors presented a
statement which showed that of these accounts (which went back to 1681),
_£_6,133,571 had then been passed, and that a considerable portion of the
remainder was waiting for technicalities only. On June 11th, 1713, it was
reported that _£_24,624,436 had been either passed or "adjusted." See
"Journals of House of Commons," xvi., xvii. [T.S.]]
[Footnote 12: Virgil, "Aeneid," i. 135.
"Whom I--but first this uproar must be quelled."--R. KENNEDY.
[T.S.]]
[Footnote 13: Tacitus, "Agricola," 9. (Tacitus wrote "Haud semper," etc.)
"An opinion not founded upon any suggestions of his own, but upon his
being thought equal to the station. Common fame does not always err,
sometimes it even directs a choice" ("Oxford Translation" revised).
[T.S.]]
[Footnote 14: Harley, who was created Earl of Oxford and Earl Mortimer,
May 23rd, 1711, and Sir Simon Harcourt, made Baron Harcourt, September
3rd, 1711. [T.S.]]
[Footnote 15: Sir Henry Furnese (1658-1712), Bart. He obtained his
baronetcy June 18th, 1707, and was the first to receive that dignity
since the Union. He sat in the House as Member for Bramber and Sandwich,
and was twice expelled. He was, however, re-elected for Sandwich and
represented that constituency until his death on November 30th, 1712.
The variety of ways in which his name has been spelt is quite remarkable.
In the "Calendar of State Papers" for 1691 and 1692, the name is given as
Furness, Furnese, and Furnes. The "Journals of the House of Commons,"
recording his expulsion, speaks of him as Furnesse. When he was knighted
(October 11th, 1691), the "Gazette" of October 19th printed it Furnace,
and when he was made a baronet, the same journal had it Furnese. In the
official "Return of Names of Members," the name is given successively as,
Furnace, Furnac, Furnice, Furnise, Furness and Furnese. [T.S.]]
[Footnote 16: Laurence Hyde, Earl of Rochester, second son of the first
Earl of Clarendon (see No. 27, _ante_, p. 170). He undertook the defence
of his father when the latter was impeached by the House of Commons,
October 30th, 1667, on a charge of high treason. [T.S.]]
[Footnote 17: Virgil, "Aeneid," vi. 648-9.
"Warriors, high souled, in better ages born,
Great Teucer's noble race, these plains adorn."--J.M. KING.
[T.S.]]
[Footnote 18: "When the tumultuous perplexed charge of accumulated
treasons was preferred against him by the Commons; his son Laurence, then
a Member of that House, stept forth with this brave defiance to his
accusers, that, if they could make out any proof of any one single
article, he would, as he was authorized, join in the condemnation of his
father" (Burton's "Genuineness of Clarendon's History," p. 111). [T.S.]]