Earth, greedy of scraping up the Dirt they came from, and yet without Hearts to use, for the Gratification of their leaden Carcasses, what they had sacrificed their immortal Souls to obtain.

I mean the late leading Directors of Three great Stocks; a Heap of sordid Animals, who (tho' solid, heavy, and exquisitely dull in all Matters and Things, but the Art of Cheating; in which Diabolical Science, a Footman, a Drayman, a Butcher, or a Wool-picker (as by dreadful Experience we have found, and by Examples may be made out) may, with the Aid, and under the Direction of the Devil, their universal Master, arrive at as great Perfection, as a Pope, a Cardinal, or even a Jamaica Bucanier: yet) wretched Tools as they are (upon pretence of letting their Fellow-Subjects into the fatal Secret, how such Lumps of Clay had amass'd the immense Riches the voracious Monsters then possess'd) have deluded the dextrous Courtier, the ancient Nobility, the brave Gentry, the devout Clergy, the honest fair-trading Merchant, the diligent Shopkeeper, and the Charitable and useful Employers of our numberless Manufacturers, with other Persons of all Religions, Qualities, Denominations, Sexes, and Parties; and that by Impositions greater, and more opposite to all the Senses than Transubstantiation it self: As

First, By persuading them to believe that Paper, dignify'd with the Name of Knight or Caswall, upon it,1 was preferable to Gold, Silver, or the Land of their Ancestors: And then, that One Pound in their Stocks (could they but be so happy as to get in there) would, under the Management of these leaden Rogues, be intrinsically worth more than Ten Pounds in the honest Mens Pockets who trusted them.

And this Mystery of Iniquity having been carried the Lengths we have seen it, even to the imminent Hazard of the most happy of all Constitutions both in Church and State, I shall endeavour to let the World see by what deceitful Methods these mean, weak, wicked Upstarts have been enabled to impose upon Men of a Thousand times more refin'd Parts, and greater Experience, than themselves.

1 Knight, the absconding treasurer, and Caswall countersigned the South Sea securities.

89. THE "DRAPIER LETTERS" (1724).

Among the thousands of political pamphlets which have been published in England since the meeting of the Long Parliament, a few survive by intrinsic merit; the rest, so far as common knowledge goes, have perished. Most of them are anonymous and irresponsible, issued in support of a factious interest and paid for with ready money. But if at one end of the scale the Grub Street hack figures conspicuously, at the other end are Swift and Burke. The century 1650-1750 is the prolific age of pamphleteers, and its climax may be fixed at the reign of Queen Anne. Swift was then a trenchant advocate of Tory principles, and his tractarian activity continued into the reign of George I. His Drapier Letters, attacking Wood's coinage, proved very effective, and are to this day an example of the political pamphlet at its best. The series opens as follows. SOURCE. The Drapier Letters. Jonathan Swift (1667-1745). Works ed. John Nichols. London (no date). Vol. viii., p. 3.

Letter I.

TO THE TRADESMEN, SHOPKEEPERS, FARMERS,
AND COUNTRY PEOPLE IN GENERAL, OF

THE KINGDOM OF IRELAND,

CONCERNING THE BRASS HALFPENCE COINED BY ONE WILLIAM WOOD, HARDWAREMAN, WITH A DESIGN

TO HAVE THEM PASS IN THIS KINGDOM.

Wherein is shown the power of his Patent, the value of his Halfpence, and how far every person may be obliged to take the same in payments, and how to behave himself, in case such an attempt should be made by Wood, or any other person.

(Very proper to be kept in every family).

BY M. B. DRAPIER.

BRETHREN, FRIENDS, COUNTRYMEN,

AND FELLOW-SUBJECTS,

1724.

What I intend now to say to you, is, next to your duty to God, and the care of your salvation, of the greatest concern to yourselves and your children: your bread and clothing, and

every common necessary of life, entirely depend upon it. Therefore I do most earnestly exhort you, as men, as Christians, as parents, and as lovers of your country, to read this paper with the utmost attention, or get it read to you by others; which that you may do at the less expense, I have ordered the printer to sell it at the lowest rate.

It is a great fault among you, that when a person writes with no other intention than to do you good, you will not be at the pains to read his advices. One copy of this paper may serve a dozen of you, which will be less than a farthing a-piece. It is your folly, that you have no common or general interest in your view, not even the wisest among you; neither do you know, or inquire, or care, who are your friends, or who are your enemies. About four years ago a little book was written,1 to advise all people to wear the manufactures of this our own dear country. It had no other design, said nothing against the king or parliament, or any person whatsoever; yet the poor printer was prosecuted two years with the utmost violence, and even some weavers themselves (for whose sake it was written) being upon the JURY, found him guilty. This would be enough to discourage any man from endeavouring to do you good, when you will either neglect him, or fly in his face for his pains, and when he must expect only danger to himself, and to be fined and imprisoned, perhaps to his ruin.

However, I cannot but warn you once more of the manifest destruction before your eyes, if you do not behave yourselves as you ought.

I will therefore first tell you the plain story of the fact; and then I will lay before you how you ought to act, in common prudence, according to the laws of your country.

The fact is this: It having been many years since COPPER HALFPENCE OR FARTHINGS were last coined in this kingdom, they have been for some time very scarce, and many counterfeits passed about under the name of raps; several applications were made to England, that we might have liberty to coin new ones, as in former times we did; but they did not succeed. At last one Mr. Wood, a mean ordinary man, a hardware dealer, procured a patent under his majesty's broad seal to coin £108,000 in copper for this kingdom; which patent, however, did not oblige anyone here to take them, unless they pleased. Now you must know, that the halfpence and farthings in England. pass for very little more than they are worth; and if you

1 Swift's Proposal for the Use of Irish Manufactures.

should beat them to pieces, and sell them to the brasier, you would not lose much above a penny in the shilling. But Mr. Wood made his halfpence of such base metal, and so much smaller than the English ones, that the brasier would hardly give you above a penny of good money for a shilling of his; so that this sum of £108,000, in good gold and silver, must be given for trash, that will not be worth above eight or nine thousand pounds real value. But this is not the worst; for Mr. Wood, when he pleases, may by stealth send over another £108,000, and buy all our goods for eleven parts in twelve under the value. For example, if a hatter sells a dozen of hats for five shillings a-piece, which amounts to three pounds, and receives the payment in Wood's coin, he really receives only the value of five shillings.

Perhaps you will wonder how such an ordinary fellow as this Mr Wood could have so much interest as to get his MAJESTY'S broad seal for so great a sum of bad money to be sent to this poor country; and that all the nobility and gentry here could not obtain the same favour, and let us make our own halfpence, as we used to do. Now I will make that matter very plain: we are at great distance from the king's court, and have nobody there to solicit for us, although a great number of lords and 'squires, whose estates are here, and are our countrymen, spend all their lives and fortunes there; but this same Mr. Wood was able to attend constantly for his own interest; he is an Englishman, and had great friends; and, it seems, knew very well where to give money to those that would speak to others, that could speak to the king, and would tell a fair story. And his majesty, and perhaps the great lord or lords who advise. him, might think it was for our country's good; and so, as the lawyers express it, "the king was deceived in his grant," which often happens in all reigns. And I am sure if his majesty knew that such a patent, if it should take effect according to the desire of Mr. Wood, would utterly ruin this kingdom, which has given such great proofs of its loyalty, he would immediately recall it, and perhaps show his displeasure to somebody or other but a word to the wise is enough. Most of you must have heard with what anger our honourable House of Commons received an account of this Wood's patent. There were several fine speeches made upon it, and plain proofs, that it was all a wicked cheat from the bottom to the top; and several smart votes were printed, which that same Wood had the assurance to answer likewise in print; and in so confident a way, as if he were a better man than our whole parliament put together.

90. BOLINGBROKE AND WALPOLE (1733).

Walpole's Excise Bill was a target which collected many shafts, some sharp and some blunt. The cleverest attacks on this measure appeared in the Craftsman, a newspaper founded in 1726 by Pulteney, Bolingbroke and Wyndham, and deriving its best ideas from Bolingbroke. He was then at his intellectual prime and a dangerous foe, despite the parliamentary torpor which Walpole's system of corruption had secured. His papers in the Craftsman, of which one is selected, are typical of his style in discussing political subjects, and convey a clear idea of his animosity towards Walpole.

SOURCE.-The Craftsman. Probably by Bolingbroke (1678-1751). July 14, 1733. No. 367.

SIR,

The Craftsman, July 14, 1733.

A Portuguese Carpenter, with some friends, passing by a crucifix erected on the road near Lisbon, his companions pulled off their hats as usual, but he took no notice of it. Being asked the reason, he reply'd, he could not bring himself to worship a cross which he made but yesterday out of his own crabtree. This carries a good moral, and is an instance that the sudden elevation of an unworthy object, instead of acquiring dignity will only be attended with contempt and ridicule.

The matter must, in some measure, answer the dignity intended to be given it. Let the most ingenious artist represent Jove with his eagle and thunderbolt in straw, or Alexander the Great in mud, the God, the Hero, and the Artist will all three become contemptible.

The ludicrous image of St. Taffy, hung up every first of March, justly excites the resentment of the brave CambroBritons, who cannot patiently see their patron-saint represented in straw and ticking.

The anniversary, national justice, executed every 5th of Novemb. on the Devil, the Pope, and their adherents, would make deeper impressions on the minds of my fellow subjects, if those personages were exhibited in nobler materials. For this reason, when a famous Projector was treated in the same manner, on the 11th of April last, he was equip'd in a manner suitable to his character; which had such an uncommon effect