TO THE

PUBLISHER

OF THE

INDEPENDENT WHIG.

SIR,

HAVE bech informed, that you are now preparing a Fifth Edition of the Independent Whig. I reflect with much Pleasure on the great

and lafting Efteem which these

Papers have deservedly gained. Far from being written with the Spirit of Party, far from being ever defigned to promote the low and mean Pur fuits of private Paffion, they have long out-lived the Date of Party-writings: And as the candid Spirit which produced them, was above fuch ungenerous Contentions, fo will they live beyond them. They will live to a Day when the very Names of Parties fhall hardly be remembred, when the Feuds and Contests of thofe Times

in

in which they were produced, shall no longer engage the Attention of Men; when Ambition is laid low; when Divifions are laid afide, and even Defamation is filent. Whilft the Love of Truth and Liberty fhall prevail in the World, this Collection fhall be preferved as facred to the Interefts of both; as their noble Foundation is eternal Truth and good Senfe, as their only End is the Preservation of that common Good which every Man is born to enjoy in Right of his Creation, and which he ought always to enjoy against the exorbitant Claims of fuperftitious Priests, the vile Arts which they practise to deceive, and the Power which they ufurp to opprefs.

THIS then is the Caufe of Liberty and Reafon, a Cause which itself requires, and whose Friends can with it no better Advantage than to be seen and tried in open Day. This is moft worthy of Conqueft and Triumph. It fights to fave, and it conquers to deliver. Slavery flies its Approach, and Liberty attends its Victories. This likewife is that Cause which is fure of Succefs, where the wicked and corrupt Agents of dark Iniquity cannot blind the People with myfterious Delusion, nor put out their Eyes by the Authority of Laws. Against these impudent Pretensions, and unwarrantable Practices, fatally common to all Ages and Nations, where-everAm

bition inspires the Love of Power, or whereever Avarice incites the Luft of Rapine, have the Authors of this Collection appeared with fo great Reputation and Succefs, that I know not which is the clearest Evidence of their Merit, the Number and Distinction of their Friends, or the Outrage of their Enemies.

INDEED the Rage of Nonfenfe is too feeble to fupport itself. Even the Cause that gives it Fury, cannot give it Life; it raves, and dies.' The moft flaming Stupidity that ever appeared inDefiance of common Sense, how much foever it might ferve to fire ignorant Multitudes for a prefent Hour, loft all its Force, and Credit, and Effect, in the next; loft even the Applause of those whose Interefts had Service from it. The moft elaborate and well-written Piece of Nonfenfe is but the Being of a Day: If happily timed, it hath its Admirers; when the Season is paft, it wants even Readers. The very Memory of it can have no Existence, unless a Work of Senfe and Meaning give it Life by taking notice of it, and Posterity read it bound up with those Writings, which it was meant to deprefs and difcredit. What a Secret would it be with Men, that Filmer ever wrote, or that Sacheverel ever preached, if the Honourable ALGERNON SIDNEY and Mr. LOCKE had not answered one, and if the House of Commons had VOL. I. C

not

not impeached the other? How rarely do we ever meet with the former, but in the immortal Works of his great Adverfaries? And how feldom do we find the other, but in the Account of his Trial?

THE Zeal which I have for the Papers contained in those Volumes now under your Care, makes me fond even of fome of the most miferable Nonsense that ever was published against them; and though I have reafon to believe, that fuch raving Folly will meet with few Admirers, methinks it ought not to be deftitute of Readers. To fupprefs it, would be an Honour which it very ill deferves. It would thereby share the Fate of the most deferving Writings. This would be treating the most impotent Nonsense as if it was Sense and Integrity. Such Confiderations induce me to think, that we ought not to treat with Neglect the doughty Performance of the Bishop of SODOR and MANN, or the Bull which he published against the Independent Whig. The Bifhop is a Gentleman of fome Figure; the Nonsense of the Bull is equally confpicuous: In fhort, it is Dulness epifcopally eminent. And though a Perfon, even of his Character, should not have Credit enough to keep fuch a Performance alive; yet the Independent Whig may preferve it, and ought to preserve it. The Authors of that ufeful Book owe this

Regard