him miscarry in the first. It is no unwise proceeding, which the writers of that side have taken up, to scatter their menaces in every paper they publish; it may perhaps look absurd, ridiculous, and impudent, in people at mercy to assume such a style; but the design is right, to endeavour persuading the world that it is they who are the injured party, that they are the sufferers, and have a right to be angry.

However, there is one point, wherein these gentlemen seem to stretch this wise expedient, a little farther than it will allow. I, who for several months undertook to examine into the late management of persons and things, was content sometimes to give only a few hints of certain matters, which I had charity enough to wish might be buried for ever in oblivion, if the confidence of these people had not forced them from me. One instance whereof, among many, is the business of Gregg, the subject of a letter I am now considering. If this piece has been written by direction, as I should be apt to suspect; yet, I am confident, they would not have us think so, because it is a sort of challenge, to let the world into the whole secret of Gregg's affair. But I suppose they are confident, it is what I am not master of, wherein it is odds but they may be mistaken; for I believe the memorials of that transaction are better preserved, than they seem to be aware of, as perhaps may one day appear.

This writer is offended, because I have said so many severe things with application to particular persons. The Medley has been often in the same story if they condemn it as a crime in general, I shall not much object; at least I will allow it should be done with truth and caution: but, by what argu

ment will they undertake to prove that it is pardonable on one side, and not on the other? Since the late change of ministry, I have observed many of that party take up a new style, and tell us, "That "this way of personal reflection ought not to be "endured; they could not approve of it; it was

ઃઃ

against charity and good manners." When the whigs were in power, they took special care to keep their adversaries silent; then all kind of falsehood and scurrility was doing good service to the cause, and detecting evil principles. Now, that the face of things is changed, and we have liberty to retort upon them, they are for calling down fire from Heaven upon us; though, by a sort of indulgence which they were strangers to, we allow them equal liberty of the press with ourselves; and they even now make greater use of it, against persons in the highest power and credit, than we do against those who have been discarded, for the most infamous abuse of both.

Who encouraged and rewarded the Observator and Review, for many years together, in charging the whole body of the clergy with the most odious crimes and opinions; in declaring all who took oaths to the government, and called themselves tories, to be worse than papists and nonjurors; in exposing the universities, as seminaries of the most pernicious principles in church and state; in defending the rebellion, and the murder of king Charles I, which they asserted to be altogether as justifiable as the late revolution? Is there a great man now in power, or in any credit with the queen, whom those worthy undertakers have not treated, by name, in the most ignominious manner? Even since this great change

of

of affairs, with what amazing licentiousness has the writer of the Medley attacked every person of the present ministry, the speaker of the house of commons, and the whole senate! He has turned into ridicule the results of the council and the parliament, as well as the just and generous endeavours of the latter, to pay the debts, and restore the credit of the nation, almost ruined by the corruption and management of his own party.

And are these the people who complain of personal reflections; who so confidently invoke the men in power (whom they have so highly obliged) to punish or silence me for reflecting on their exploded heroes? Is there no difference between men chosen by the prince, reverenced by the people for their virtue, and others rejected by both for the highest demerits? Shall the Medley and his brothers fly out with impunity against those who preside at the helm ? and am I to be torn in pieces, because I censure others, who, for endeavouring to split the vessel against a rock, are put under the hatches?

I now proceed to the pamphlet which I intend to consider. It is a letter written to seven great men, who were appointed to examine Gregg in Newgate. The writer tells their lordships, that the Examiner has charged them with endeavouring, by bribery and subornation of that criminal, to take away Mr. Harley's life. If there be any thing among the papers I have writ, which may be applied to these persons, it would have become this author to have cleared them fully from the accusation, and then he might at leisure have fallen upon me as a liar and misrepresenter; but of that he has not offered a syllable:

syllable: the weight of his charge lies here; that such an author as the Examiner, should presume, by certain innuendoes, to accuse any great persons of such a crime. My business, in those papers, was to represent facts; and I was as sparing as possible of reflecting upon particular persons: but the mischief is, that the readers have always found names to tally with those facts; and I know no remedy for this. As for instance, in the case here before us. An under clerk in the secretary's office, of fifty pounds a year, is discovered to hold correspondence with France, and apprehended by his master's order, before he could have opportunity to make his escape by the private warning of a certain person, a professed enemy to the secretary. The criminal is condemned to die. It is found, upon his trial, that he was a poor profligate fellow: the secretary, at that time, was under the mortal hatred of a violent prevailing party, who dreaded him for his great abilities, and his avowed design to break their destructive

measures.

It was very well known, that a secretary of state has little or no intercourse with the lower clerks, but with the under secretaries, who are the more immediate masters of those clerks, and are, and ought to be, as they then were, gentlemen of worth: however, it would pass well enough in the world, that Gregg was employed in Mr. secretary Harley's office, and was consequently one of his clerks, which would be ground enough to build upon it what suggestions they pleased. Then for the criminal, he was needy and vicious: he owed his death to the secretary's watchful pursuit of him, and would

therefore

therefore probably incline to hearken to any offers that would save his life, gratify his revenge, and make him easy in his fortune: so that, if a work of darkness were to be done, it must be confessed, here were proper motives, and a proper instrument. But ought we to suspect any persons of such a diabolical practice? can all faith and honour and justice be thus violated by men? questions proper for a pulpit, or well becoming a philosopher: but what if it were regnandi causa, and that perhaps in a literal sense? Is this an age of the world to think crimes improbable because they are great? Perhaps it is; but what shall we say to some of those circumstances which attended this fact? who gave rise to this report against Mr. Harley? will any of his enemies confess, in cold blood, that they did either believe, suspect, or imagine, the secretary, and one of his under clerks, to be joined in corresponding with France? Some of them, I should think, knew better what belonged to such a correspondence, and how it ought to be managed. The nature of Gregg's crime was such, as to be best performed without any accomplices at all; it was, to be a spy here for the French, and to tell them all he knew; and it appears, by his letters, that he never had it in his power to let them into any thing of importance. The copy of the queen's letter to the emperor, which he sent to the enemy, and has made such a noise, was only to desire that prince Eugene might be employed to command in Spain; which, for six weeks before, had been mentioned in all the Gazettes of Europe. It was evident, from the matter of his letters, that no man of consequence could have any share in them. The whole affair had been examined in the cabinet two

months