Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 19.djvu/124

112 regard of the tories; and the whigs will easily find the method of paying him, and themselves into the bargain, at the expense of the people, and with the most careless contempt of their adversaries. A prime minister, under the inoffensive title of treasurer, or secretary; a privy council, under the title of parliament, the majority of which is gained over by his art or his largesses, and who, in return, secure the nation, with all its wealth, will, and power, in the most implicit obedience to him, and consequently to his master; does all the business of the crown to a wonder, and reduces the people, by their own consent, to as much slavery as is convenient for all the purposes of the prince.

Thus, in regard of the government, Clarendon's politicks are entirely overset. He has ruined one royal family by leaving it at the mercy of the people: he has ruined the rights of the people, by leaving them at the mercy of another, that has been too cunning for him, and found the knack of keeping them, whom he proposed to leave masters for ever, under perpetual and unlimited subjection, by the help and corruption of their representatives, notwithstanding the addition of new and more irksome limitations of the crown. He had destroyed the cavaliers at the restoration; and has given the coup de grace to the tories at the revolution, which was a child of his own begetting upon the body of the former iniquity.

The world has never seen a frame of government so nicely fitted for all the purposes of the sovereign, as the present constitution of England. The king has not a foot of land; yet all Great Britain is his property in fact: he is under the most unbecoming restrictions