The Letters of the Celebrated Junius Volume 1 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1783 edition. Excerpt: ... LETTER XXIV. TO HIS GR.ACK THE DUKE OF GRAFTON. MY LORD, 8 July, 1769. IF nature had given you an understanding qualisied to keep pace with the wishes and principles of your heart, she would have made you, perhaps, the most formidable minister that ever was employed, under a limited monarch, to accomplish the ruin of a free people. When neither the feelings of shame, the reproaches of conscience, nor the dread of punishment, form any bar to the designs of a minister, the people would have too much reason to lament their condition, if they did not sind some resource in the weakness of his understanding. We owe it to the bounty of providence, that the completest depravity of the heart is sometimes strangely united with a confusion of the mind, which counteracts the most favourite principles, and makes the fame man treacherous without art, and a hypocrite without deceiving. The measures, for instance, in which your Grace's activity has been chiefly exerted, as.they were adopted without skill, hhould have been conducted with more than common dexterity. But ISut truly, my Lord, the execution has been as gross as the design. By one decisive step, you have defeated all the arts of writing. You have fairly confounded the intrigues of opposition, and silenced the clamours of faction. A dark, ambiguous system might require and furnish the materials of ingenious illustration; and, in doubtful measures, the virulent exaggeration of party must be employed, to rouse and engage the passions of the people. You have now brought the merits of yur administration to an issue, on which every Englishman of the narrowest capacity, may determine for himself. It is not an alarm to the passions, but a calm appeal to the judgement of the people, upon their...