Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 10.djvu/387

Rh was kept for king James by the duke of Gordon) sir Thomas and my lord Kilsyth went into the town, to receive duke Hamilton's command, who was then high commissioner; and some other officers went in at the same time, to see their wives and friends.

The duke asked sir Thomas, where I was? And, being informed that I was gone to Stirling, desired I might be sent for. Upon my attending his grace, he was pleased to say, that he had been always my friend; and that he now had it in his power to provide for me, if I would be true to my trust (for he supposed I had taken the oath to king William) and upon my answer, that I would be true to what I had sworn, the duke replied, it was very well.

Upon this occasion, and before I proceed farther, I think it will be proper, to make some apology for my future conduct; because I am conscious, that many people, who are in another interest, may be apt to think and speak hardly of me: but I desire they would please to consider, that the Revolution was then an event altogether new, and had put many men much wiser than myself at a loss how to proceed. I had taken the oath of allegiance to king James; and having been bred up in the strictest principles of loyalty, could not force my conscience to dispense with that oath, during his majesty's life. All those persons of quality in Scotland to whom I had been most obliged, and on whom I chiefly depended, did still adhere to that prince. Those people whom, from my youth, I had been taught to abhor: whom, by the commands of my superiours, I had constantly treated as rebels; and who consequently conceived an irreconcileable animosity against me; were, upon this great change, the highest in favour and employments. And