Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 4.djvu/168

160 is not to be denied, that acting as they do upon a national interest, they may seem to stand in less need of such supports, or may safely fling them down as no longer necessary. But, if the leaders of the other party had proceeded by this maxim, their power would have been none at all, or of very short duration: and had not some active pens fallen in to improve the good dispositions of the people upon the late change, and continued since to overthrow the falsehood plentifully, and sometimes not un plausibly, scattered by the adversaries, I am very much in doubt whether those at the helm would now have reason to be pleased with their success. A particular person may with more safety despise the opinion of the vulgar, because it does a wise man no real harm or good, but the administration a great deal; and whatever side has the sole management of the pen, will soon find hands enough to write down their enemies, as low as they please. If the people had no other idea of those whom her majesty trusts in her greatest affairs, than what is conveyed by the passions of such as would compass sea and land for their destruction; what could they expect, but to be torn in pieces by the rage of the multitude? How necessary therefore was it, that the world should, from time to time, be undeceived by true representations of persons and tacts, which have kept the kingdom steady to its interests, against all the attacks of a cunning and virulent faction!

However, the mischiefs of the press were too exorbitant to be cured by such a remedy as a tax upon the smaller papers; and a bill for a much more effectual regulation of it, was brought into the