Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 35.djvu/195

 , Cornwall, M.P. for St. Ives in 1708, took the additional name of Praed, and was an ancestor of the poet. Mackworth's political and financial publications comprised: 1. 'England's Glory, or the Great Improvement of Trade by a Royal Bank or Office of Credit to be erected in London,' 1694. 2. 'A Vindication of the Rights of the Commons of England,' 1701. This tract was included in the editions of 'Somers Tracts,' 1751 and 1809. 3. 'Peace at Home, or a Vindication of the Proceedings of the House of Commons on the Bill for Preventing Danger from Occasional Conformity,' 1704, which provoked many replies, including one from Defoe, entitled 'Peace without Union.' 4. 'A Letter from a member of Parliament to his Friend in the Country, giving a Short Account of the Proceedings of the Tackers' [anon.], 1704. 5. 'A Bill for the better Relief, Employment, and Settlement of the Poor,' 1704. 6. 'Free Parliaments, or a Vindication of the Fundamental Right of the Commons of England to be sole Judges of the Privileges of the Electors and of the Elected; being a Vindication of the Proceedings in the Case of Ashby against White,' 1704. An abstract of this work appeared in 1705; it was reproduced as an appendix to 'The State of the Case between Ashby and White,' 1705, and it was included in the editions of 'Somers Tracts,' 1751 and 1909. 7. 'A Brief Account of the Tack, in a Letter to a Friend' [anon.], 1705. 8. 'Down with the Mug, or Reasons for Supressing the Mug Houses' [anon.], 1717. 9. 'A Proposal for Paying of the Public Debts by the appropriated Funds, without raising Taxes upon Land, Malt, or other things for that purpose' [anon,], 1720. 10. 'Sir Humphry Mackworth's Proposal, being a new Scheme offer'd for the Payment of the Public Debts,' 1720. This scheme, which passed through five editions in 1720, was of the same kind as that suggested by John Law in France, and involved the creation of 'a new species of money.'

Mackworth was also the author of a 'Treatise concerning the Divine Authority of the Scriptures, the Divinity of our Blessed Saviour,' &c., 2nd edit. 1704, which was suplemented by 'A Discourse by way of Dialogue concerning (1) Providence, (2) the Happiness of a Religious Life,' &c., 1705.

 MACKY, JOHN (d. 1726), government agent or spy, author of ‘Memoirs of Secret Services,’ was a Scotsman of good education, but of his parentage or birth nothing is known. According to his own account he ‘came early into the measures of the revolution,’ and being, on the return of King James from Ireland to France, sent to Paris to find out the further purposes of the Jacobites, he discovered that the French government intended to send an expedition against England in 1692. He arrived in London with the information before James reached his army encamped at La Hogue, and thus gave the government ample time for preparations against it. On the return of King William to England in October 1693, he was appointed inspector of the coast from Harwich to Dover in order to prevent treasonable correspondence between the two countries by passengers or letters. He discovered the proposed descent on England in 1696 in connection with the assassination plot of Sir George Barclay [q. v.]; and after its disclosure published ‘A View of the Court of St. Germains from the year 1690 to 1695, with an Account of the Entertainment Protestants meet with there, directed to the malcontent Protestants of England,’ 1696. Of this pamphlet he states that no fewer than thirty thousand copies were sold. After the peace of Ryswick, 20 Sept. 1697, he had the direction of the packet-boats from Dover to France and Flanders, and he states that during the negotiations connected with the Partition treaty in 1698 he had the charge of transmitting all the private expresses that passed between King William and Lord Portland.

The packet-boat service was discontinued after the death of King William in 1702, and Macky went to look after an estate possessed by him and others in the island of Zante, in the dominion of Venice. After the battle of Ramillies in May 1706 he had the direction of the packet-boats to Ostend, with instructions to watch narrowly all naval preparations at Ostend and other sea-coast towns; and in 1708 he discovered the preparations for an armament at Dunkirk. Subsequently he came under the suspicion of the government and was thrown into prison, where he remained till the accession of George I. On