Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 4.djvu/365

Rh consist with the grief, for the loss of so gracious and excellent a princess, as her late majesty. The parliament was most unanimous, in doing every thing that could endear them to a new monarch. The general peace did entirely put an end to any design, which France or Spain might probably have laid, to make a diversion, by an invasion upon Scotland, with the pretender at the head, in case her majesty had happened to die during the course of the war: and upon the death of the late French king, the duke of Orleans fell immediately into the strictest measures with England; as the queen and her ministers easily foresaw it would be necessary for him to do, from every reason that could regard his own interest. If the queen had died but a short time before the peace, and either of the two great powers engaged against us, had thought fit to have thrown some troops into Scotland, although it could not have been a very agreeable circumstance to a successor and a stranger, yet the universal inclinations at that time in England, toward the house of Hanover, would, in all probability, have prevented the consequences of such an enterprise. But, on the other side, if the war had continued a year longer than her majesty's life, and the same causes had been applied to produce the same effects upon the affections of the people, the issue must inevitably have been, either a long and bloody civil war, or a sudden revolution. So that no incident could have arrived more effectual, to fortify the present king's title, and secure his possession, than that very peace, so much exploded by one party, and so justly celebrated by the other; in continuing to declare which opinions, under the present Rh