LETTER XII.

TO HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF GRAFTON.

THE former Letters from JUNIUS to the Duke of Grafton, whatever secret pain they might have given his Grace, had produced no altera. tion in his public conduct. Mr. Luttrell still sat in the House of Commons, as one of the representatives for the county of Middlesex: Mr. Wilkes was not freed from the effects of the prosecution against him: those vigorous measures were not relaxed, which government had, at length, resolutely adopted, for the suppression of the riots which had too long triumphed in the metropolis. Neither did it appear, that the Duke of Grafton had either lost the confidence of his Sovereign, or himself wavered as to his intention of remaining in office. He was even strengthened in power, by an alliance of marriage, which might seem to únite him with the family and the party of the Duke of Bedford. Yet, the power of JUNIUS over public opinion, was in the mean time astonishingly increased: and he was already regarded as the most formidable of all the foes of the ministry, the ablest of all the allies of the opposition. He determined, therefore, to try what might be done by one general Letter of Satire upon the whole conduct and character of the first minister, both in public and in private life. To command new admiration of his accusatory eloquence; to render the Duke of Grafton, if possible, odious and contemptible in the judgment of all parties; to make him shrink in confusion and terror from the responsibility of ministerial office; or even to exasperate the people till they should drag him from it with tumultuous fury; were evidently the objects at which JUNIUS, in this Letter, boldly aimed.

This invective begins with an exordium, artfully framed to operate on the minds of more candid and forbearing readers, as an excuse for its malicious severity. The minister is represented, as one who, what with audacity in vice, what from weakness of understanding, scorned all the decencies of appearance, and gloried in the basest political turpitude. Why, then, would JUNIUS insinuate, spare a man thus care less of his own fame, thus lost to all sensibility of reproach? Caprice, still wavering among contrarieties, yet never deviating into wisdom or virtue, is the first and most eminent bad quality which

JUNIUS

JUNIUS here attributes to the object of his abuse. He then artfully reminds the Duke of his spurious descent from the royal family of the Stuarts; and sketches, with the hand of a master-artist, but with the outrageous injustice of the most violent of the Whigs, the characters of the virtuous and unfortunate Charles the First, and of his less honest, though more successful son, Charles the Second. He touches on these characters, only to attribute to the Duke of Grafton the combination of the worst qualities which factious malignity had imputed to them both. Then, tracing the history of the Duke's political life, from his first entrance as a conspicuous agent on the theatre of public affairs, to that present moment, he strives to display it as being every where made up only of waywardness, folly, treachery, and dishonour. The recent alliance of the Duke with the family of Bedford, is next malignantly represented; perhaps, with a view to alarm the Sovereign, as one in which he had sacrificed all considerations of delicacy and honour to the hope of a new acquisition of parliamentary interest, and of being strengthened in office even to such a degree that he might bid defiance to his King. The measures which the Duke had proposed, or supported, in regard to the taxation of America, present new scope for the continuance of this invective. That France was suffered to crush the liberties of the Corsicans; that Britain neglected to cultivate an influence with the Turks; that Sir John Moore had a pension; are so many other topics of ministerial conduct, in which the fierce satirist finds still new matter for heightened accusation. The Duke of Grafton is then represented to have consummated those mischiefs to the Sovereign and the empire, which were begun in the ostensible ministry of the Earl of Bule. The conclusion of the Letter insults the obnoxious minister, by assuring him, in a tone of the highest literary arrogance, that in this damning misrepresentation of his character would his memory be preserved, to meet the contempt and abhorrence of the most distant posterity.

The boldness of this address, the art with which the intermixture of truth in it was made to lend new credibility to falsehood, its wit, its ele gance, its lofty vehemence, the secret anecdotes which it brought into light, and the able discernment of political expediencies which it exhibited, gave it an influence inconceivably great on the minds of those to whom it was addressed. The unlucky error of ministry, in regard to the North Briton, and its author, had rendered them very much at a loss how to act concerning future political libels. Did they

prosecute?

́prosecute? Juries would perhaps protect the libeller. Did they call in the immediate aid of Parliament? Even the House of Commons was not this time sufficiently respected by the people. Should they have recourse to any of those bold measures, which the suspicion of Jacobitism, and the fear of rebellion, had once suggested and justified? It would be proclaimed, that the liberties of the people were no more; and the nation might be perhaps excited to armed resistance, as lawful in the extremity of danger to which it might be prétended that the constitution was now reduced. Thus embarrassed, the government acted with a degree of forbearance, in respect to such political invectives, as those of JUNIUS, which had scarce ever before been exemplified in the English history. If they suffered others, from an unwillingness to enter into a doubtful contention for the sake of trifles which would not fail to perish by their own insignificance; they were, by the Letters of JUNIUS, absolutely overawed, and terrified into silence. He knew that he had little to feur, and that his safe boldness gave him wonderful authority with the public above what moderation could have enjoyed. Had it not been for these circumstances, we should not now, perhaps, have possessed this eloquent epistle. Political Letters in the Newspapers were at that time the more attentively read, because accounts of the proceedings in Parliament had not yet begun to be regularly published.

MY LORD,

30. May, 1769.

IF the measures in which you have been most successful, had been supported by any tolerable appearance of argument, I should have thought my time not ill employed, in continuing to examine your conduct as a minister, and stating it fairly to the public. But when I see questions, of the highest national importance, carried as they have been, and the first principles of the constitution openly violated, without argument or decency, I confess, I give up the cause in despair. The

meanest of your predecessors had abilities sufficient to give a colour to their measures. If they invaded the rights of the people, they did not dare to offer a direct insult to their understanding; and, in former times, the most venal parliaments made it a condition, in their bargain with the minister, that he should furnish them with some plausible pretences for selling their country and themselves. You have had the merit of introducing a more compendious system of government and logic. You neither address yourself to the passions, nor to the understanding, but simply to the touch. You apply yourself immediately to the feelings of your friends; who, contrary to the forms of parliament, never enter heartily into a debate, until they have divided.

RELINQUISHING, therefore, all idle views of amendment to your Grace, or of benefit to the public, let me be permitted to consider your character and conduct merely as a subject of curious speculation. There is something in both, which distinguishes you not only from all other ministers, but all other men. It is not that you do wrong by design, but that you should never do right by mistake. It

You apply yourself immediately to the feelings of your friends, &c.] This period exhibits, in the use of the words feelings and divided, two puns, of which one cannot approve, as consistent with delicate correctness of composition; but which nevertheless produce, as we here find them, no unhappy effect, and which might well serve to excite the horse-laugh of the vulgar part of JUNIUS's readers.

is not that your indolence and your activity have been equally misapplied; but that the first uniform principle, or if I may call it the genius of your life, should have carried you through every possible change and contradiction of conduct, without the momentary imputation or colour of a virtue; and that the wildest spirit of inconsistency should never once have betrayed you into a wise or honourable action. This, I own, gives an air of singularity to your fortune, as well as to your disposition. Let us look back together to a scene, in which a mind like yours will find nothing to repent of. Let us try, my Lord, how well you have supported the various relations in which you stood to your Sovereign, your country, your friends, and yourself. Give us, if it be possible, some excuse to posterity, and to ourselves, for submitting to your administration. If not the abilities of a great minister, if not the integrity of a patriot, or the fidelity of a friend, shew us at least the firmness of a man. -For the sake of your mistress, the lover shall be spared. I

The various relations in which you stood, &c.] Here is an incongru ity of metaphor, which must not escape remark. We cannot be, with propriety, said to support that in which we stand.

For the sake of your mistress, &c.] This is a theme upon which JUNIUS delights again and again to return. He is here artfully severe, while professing tenderness; and contrives to insinuate, that the object of his satire was capable, in his intercourse with females of nothing but the ostentation of vice, and the grossest sensuality of love.