Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 4.djvu/368

360 instrument of putting the nation to the expense of some thousand lives, and several millions of money. I have known as great an event from the stupidity, or wilfulness, of a beggarly Dutchman, who lingered on purpose half an hour at a visit, when he had promised to be somewhere else. Of no greater dignity was that circumstance, which rendered ineffectual, all endeavours of the late ministry, to establish themselves in the good graces of the court of Hanover, as I shall particularly relate in another work. It may suffice to hint at present, that a delay in conveying a very inconsiderable sum, to a very inconsiderable French vagrant, gave the opportunity to a more industrious party, of corrupting that channel, through which all the ideas of the dispositions and designs of the queen, the ministers, and the whole British nation, were conveyed.

The second point which I conceived myself able to make out, is this: that if the queen's ministers had, with or without the knowledge of their mistress, entertained any thoughts of altering the succession in favour of the pretender, it was absolutely necessary for them, to have begun and prosecuted that design, as soon as they came into her majesty's service.

There were two circumstances, which would have made it necessary for them to have lost no time. First, because it was a work that could not possibly be done on a sudden; for the whole tion,