Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 18.djvu/95

Rh of money in England: but in whose hands? Those who have had the management of such prodigious sums as have been given these last three and twenty years, on pretence of carrying on the war. Inquire what sums the late lord treasurer left the exchequer, and what immense debts in the navy and elsewhere: how the funds were all anticipated or loaded. Observe but what industry has been used, that the late party should part with none of their vast wealth to assist the present exigency; and then let us wonder at the wisdom and conduct of that ministry, which has been able to wade through all these difficulties, restore credit, and uphold the armies abroad: and can we doubt, after this, of their entering into the true interests of the nation, or dispute the peace they shall think fit to advise the queen to make? How can our malicious author say, "That it will be a severe mortification for so great and successful a general, to see the fruits of his victories thrown all away at once, by a shameful and scandalous peace; after a war of nine years, carried on with continued successes, greater than have been known in story? And how grievous must it be to him, to have no footstep remain, except the building at Woodstock, of all the great advantages which he has obtained for the queen and the British nation, against their dangerous enemy; and consequently of his own extraordinary merit to her majesty and his country?" No! are they about to take the garter from him? to unprince, unduke him? to confiscate all his large possessions, except Woodstock? those vast sums in the . XVIII.