Page:Letters of Junius, volume 2 (Woodfall, 1772).djvu/260

250 the crown are no longer confided in. Corruption glitters in the van;—collects and maintains a standing army of mercenaries, and at the same moment impoverishes and enslaves the country.—His majesty's predecessors (excepting that worthy family from which you, my Lord, are unquestionably descended) had some generous qualities in their composition, with vices, I confess, or frailties in abundance. They were kings or gentlemen, not hypocrites or priests. They were at the head of the church, but did not know the value of their office. They said their prayers without ceremony, and had too little priestcraft in their understanding, to reconcile the sanctimonious forms of religion with the utter destruction of the morality of their people.—My Lord, this is fact, not declamation.—With all your partiality to the house of Stuart, you must confess, that even Charles the Second would have blushed at that open encouragement, at those eager, meretricious caresses, with which every species of private vice and public prostitution is received at St. James's. The unfortunate house of Stuart has been treated with an asperity which, if comparison be a defence, seems to border upon injustice. Neither