Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 4.djvu/376

368 libellers have charged upon them, at least till toward the end of their ministry; and then, very absurdly, because the want of time, and other circumstances, rendered such a work impossible, for several reasons which I have already related.

And whoever considers the late queen, so little enterprising in her nature, so much given to delay, and at the same time so obstinate in her opinions, (as restiness is commonly attended with slowness) so great a pursuer of peace and quiet, and so exempt from the two powerful passions of love and hatred; will hardly think she had a spirit turned for such an undertaking: if we add to this, the contempt she often expressed for the person and concerns of the chevalier her brother, of which I have already said enough to be understood.

It has been objected against the late queen and her servants, as a mark of no favourable disposition toward the house of Hanover, that the electoral prince was not invited to reside in England: and at the same time, it ought to be observed, that this objection was raised and spread, by the leaders of that party, who first opposed the counsel of inviting him; offering, among other arguments against it, the example of queen Elizabeth, who would not so much as suffer her successor to be declared, expressing herself, that she would not live with her gravestone always in her sight; although the case be by no means parallel between the two queens. For, in her late majesty's reign, the crown was as firmly settled on the Hanover family, as the legislature could do it: and the question was only, whether the presumptive heir, of distant kindred, should keep his court in the same kingdom and metropolis with