Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 9.djvu/47

Rh than have all my substance taxed at seventeen shillings in the pound, at the arbitrary will and pleasure of the venerable Mr. Wood.

The paragraph concludes thus: N. B. (that is to say, nota bene, or mark well) No evidence appeared from Ireland, or elsewhere, to prove the mischiefs complained of, or any abuses whatsoever committed in the execution of the said grant.

The impudence of this remark exceeds all that went before. First, the house of commons in Ireland, which represents the whole people of the kingdom; and secondly, the privy council addressed his majesty against these halfpence: what could be done more to express the universal sense of the nation? If his copper were diamonds, and the kingdom were entirely against it, would not that be sufficient to reject it? Must a committee of the whole house of commons, and our whole privy-council, go over to argue pro and con with Mr. Wood? To what end did the king give his patent for coining halfpence in Ireland? Was it not because it was represented to his sacred majesty, that such a coinage would be of advantage to the good of this kingdom, and of all his subjects here: It is to the patentee's peril, if this representation be false, and the execution of his patent be fraudulent and corrupt. Is he so wicked and foolish to think, that his patent was given him to ruin a million and a half of people, that he might be a gainer of three or fourscore thousand pounds to himself? Before he was at the charge of passing a patent, much more of raking up so much filthy dross, and stamping it with his majesty's image and superscription, should he not first in common sense, in common Rh