The Works of the Late Right Honourable Henry St. John, Lord Viscount Bolingbroke (Volume 2 ); An New Edition in Eight Volumes (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated.1809 Excerpt: ... LETTER I. SIR, SINCE the busy scene of the year is over at home, and we may perhaps wait several months before the successful negotiation's of Trance furnish us with new hopes of a general pacification, and give you occasion to carry your speculations forward, it may be proper enough for you to cast your eyes backward, to 'reflect on your own conduct, and to call yourself to account before your own tribunal. I am so much persuaded of the integrity of vour intentions, that I do not in the least suspect you will think my advice impertinent; and therefore I shall attempt to lead your thoughts on this subject by giving you an acount of some parts of a conversation, at which I happened to be present very lately. Several of your papers, and several of those which have been written against you, lay before a company which often meets, rather to live than to drink together; according to that distinctioa which Tully makes to the advantage of his owa nation over the Greeks. They dispute without As the dedication and preface, that stood at the-tead of these remarks, were written by another and a very inferior hand, they ava therefore omitted hers. strife, strife, and examine as dispassionately the events and the characters of the present age, as they reason about those which are found in history. When I came in, a gentleman was saying, that your victories had been cheaply bought; and that he had not seen one champion, able to break a lance, enter the lists against you. Upon which some were ready to observe the inconsistencies of human nature, and how hard it often proves to hire men to avow and defend even that which they are hired to act. Others were willing to hope, that corruption had not spread very wide, nor taken root very deep among us. All agreed, that if your...