their country as their chief end; therefore Bibulus shall be wholly guided and governed by them in the means and measures toward it. Is it enough for Bibulus, and the rest of the herd, to say, without farther examining, I am of the side with Clodius, or I vote with Curio? Are these proper methods to form and make up what they think fit to call the united wisdom of the nation? Is it not possible, that upon some occasion Clodius may be bold and insolent, borne away by his passion, malicious and revengeful? That Curio may be corrupt, and expose to sale his tongue or his pen? I conceive it far below the dignity, both of human nature and human reason, to be engaged in any party, the most plausible soever, upon such servile conditions.

This influence of one upon many, which seems to be as great in a people represented, as it was of old in the commons collective, together with the consequences it has had upon the legislature, has given me frequent occasion to reflect upon what Diodorus tells us of one Charondas, a lawgiver to the Sybarites, an ancient people of Italy, who was so averse from all innovation, especially when it was to proceed from particular persons, (and I suppose, that he might put it out of the power of men fond of their own notions to disturb the constitution at their pleasures, by advancing private schemes,) that he provided a statute, that whoever proposed any alteration to be made, should step out and do it with a rope about his neck if the matter proposed were generally approved, then it should pass into a law; if it went into the negative, the proposer to be immediately hanged. Great ministers may talk of what projects they please; but I am deceived if a more effectual one could ever be found for taking off (as the present phrase is) those hot, unquiet

spirits, who disturb assemblies, and obstruct public affairs, by gratifying their pride, their malice, their ambition, or their avarice.

Those who in a late reign began the distinction between the personal and politic capacity, seem to have had reason, if they judged of princes by themselves; for, I think, there is hardly to be found through all nature a greater difference between two things, than there is between a representing commoner in the function of his public calling, and the same person when he acts in the common offices of life. Here he allows himself to be upon a level with the rest of mortals; here he follows his own reason, and his own way; and rather affects a singularity in his actions and thoughts, than servilely to copy either from the wisest of his neighbours. In short, here his folly and his wisdom, his reason and his passions, are all of his own growth, not the echo or infusion of other men. But when he is got near the walls of his assembly, he assumes and affects an entire set of very different airs; he conceives himself a being of a superior nature to those without, and acting in a sphere where the vulgar methods for the conduct of human life can be of no use. He is listed in a party where he neither knows the temper, nor designs, nor perhaps the person, of his leader; but whose opinions he follows and maintains with a zeal and faith as violent as a young scholar does those of a philosopher whose sect he is taught to profess. He has neither opinions, nor thoughts, nor actions, nor talk, that he can call his own, but all conveyed to him by his leader, as wind is through an organ. The nourishment he receives has been not only chewed, but digested, before it comes into his mouth. Thus instructed, he follows the party, right or wrong,

through all his sentiments, and acquires a courage and stiffness of opinion not at all congenial with him.

This encourages me to hope, that, during the present lucid interval, the members retired to their homes may suspend a while their acquired complexions, and, taught by the calmness of the scene and the season, reassume the native sedateness of their temper. If this should be so, it would be wise in them, as individual and private mortals, to look back a little upon the storms they have raised, as well as those they have escaped to reflect, that they have been authors of a new and wonderful thing in England, which is, for a House of Commons to lose the universal favour of the numbers they represent to observe how those whom they thought fit to persecute for righteousness sake have been openly caressed by the people; and to remember how themselves sate in fear of their persons from popular rage. Now, if they would know the secret of all this unprecedented proceeding in their masters, they must not impute it to their freedom in debate, or declaring their opinions, but to that unparliamentary abuse of setting individuals upon their shoulders, who were hated by God and man. For it seems the mass of the people, in such conjunctures as this, have opened their eyes, and will not endure to be governed by Clodius and Curio, at the head of their myrmidons, though these be ever so numerous, and composed of their own representatives.

This aversion of the people against the late proceedings of the commons is an accident, that, if it last a while, might be improved to good uses for setting the balance of power a little more upon an equality than their late measures seem to promise or admit. This accident may be imputed to two causes: the first is a uni

versal fear and apprehension of the greatness and power of France, whereof the people in general seem to be very much and justly possessed, and, therefore, cannot but resent to see it, in so critical a juncture, wholly laid aside by their ministers, the commons. The other cause is a great love and sense of gratitude in the people toward their present king, grounded upon a long opinion and experience of his merit, as well as concessions to all their reasonable desires; so that it is for some time they have begun to say, and to fetch instances where he has in many things been hardly used. How long these humours may last, (for passions are momentary, and especially those of a multitude,) or what consequences they may produce, a little time will discover. But whenever it comes to pass that a popular assembly, free from such obstructions, and already possessed of more power than an equal balance will allow, shall continue to think they have not enough, but by cramping the hand that holds the balance, and by impeachments or dissensions with the nobles, endeavour still for more; I cannot possibly see, in the common course of things, how the same causes can produce different effects and consequences among us, from what they did in Greece and Rome.

THE

EXAMINER.

WHEN the Tory party, under the auspices of Harley and St John, had succeeded in displacing the able and successful administration of Godolphin, their leaders were not ignorant, that, in order to maintain the ascendance which they had gained, it was necessary at once to defend their own measures, and to arraign those of their predecessors, before the British public. With this view the EXAMINER was weekly published, in which St John himself, Atterbury, Prior, Dr Freind, and other wits of the party, exercised their powers of reasoning and of sarcasm. It became necessary, however, to devolve the task of regularly conducting the paper upon an individual author, and Swift was selected for that purpose. He was then just returned from Ireland, stung with resentment at the neglect he had experienced from Lord Wharton, and burning for revenge upon the whole Whig party. Upon the first proposal, he seems readily to have undertaken a task so congenial to his feelings; and the following Examiners, from the 13th to the 45th Number inclusive, are evidence of the spirit with which he carried on the warfare. He also wrote the first part of Number 46. Upon the character and consequences of this political publication we have already fully spoken in the Life of the Author.