Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 4.djvu/358

350, or suspect, the queen, or the ministry, to have any favourable regards toward the pretender?" They all confessed, for themselves, "That they believed nothing of the matter:" And particularly, a person at present in great employment said to me, with much frankness, "You set up the church and Sacheverell against us; and we set up trade and the pretender against you."

The second point I would observe, is this, that during the course of the late ministry, upon occasion of the libels every day thrown about, I had the curiosity to ask almost every person in great employment, "Whether they knew, or had heard, of any one particular man, (except those who professed to be nonjurors) that discovered the least inclination toward the pretender." And the whole number they could muster up, did not amount to above five or six; among which, one was a certain old lord lately dead, and one a private gentleman, of little consequence, and of a broken fortune: yet I do not believe myself to have omitted any one great man that came in my way, except the duke of Buckingham, in whose company I never was above once or twice at most. I am, therefore, as confident as a man can be of any truth which will not admit a demonstration, that, upon the queen's death, if we except papists and nonjurors, there could not be five hundred persons in England, of all ranks, who had any thoughts of the pretender; and among these, not six of any quality or consequence: but how it has come to pass that several millions are said to have since changed their sentiments, it shall not be my part to inquire.

The last point is of the same strain; and I offer it, like