SOME

REMARKS

UPON A PAMPHLET ENTITLED

A LETTER TO THE SEVEN LORDS OF

THE COMMITTEE APPOINTED TO EXAMINE GREG.

BY THE AUTHOR OF THE EXAMINER.

FIRST PRINTED IN 1711.

THE story of Greg was briefly this. He was a vicious and necessitous person, incautiously admitted by Mr Harley, when secretary of state, into his office as a clerk. The lowness of this man's salary, and the negligence with which papers of consequence were left exposed to his inspection, prompted him to open a treasonable correspondence with Monsieur Chamillard, to betray to France the secrets of the British Government. Being almost immediately detected, a committee of seven lords, all zealous Whigs, were appointed for his examination. These were the Dukes of Devonshire, Somerset, and Bolton, the Earl of Wharton, Lord Viscount Townsend, Lord Somers, and Lord Halifax. the intrigue, by which Harley was placed in opposition to the Whig interest, was already concocted, there can be no doubt that the committee were desirious to fix upon him some accession to the crime of his clerk. For this purpose, Greg was repeatedly examined while in Newgate. Nay, after he had been tried and condemned for high treason at the Old Bailey, (19th January 1708-9,) he was respited from time to time till the 28th of April following. But during this space, having, as it were, life and death before his eyes, Greg never varied from his original declaration, that he had no accomplices, and had committed the crime

As

merely from private mercenary motives.

Even his dying speech, in which he fully and explicitly exculpated Harley, by name, from any participation in his guilt, was, contrary to custom and to justice, withheld from the public by the sheriff, until a direct application was made to Lord Sunderland, which he was probably ashamed to refuse. The committee of nobles evinced so much anxiety to extort a farther confession from this criminal, that they lost the advantage which they had gained over Harley. In resenting the undue exertions made to implicate the secretary in a crime of which he was innocent, the public forgot the culpable negligence with which the secrets of the state had been exposed in his office to the meanest clerks, and his want of caution in chusing inferiors unfit to be trusted in that station.

When Harley came into office, and was wounded by Guiscard, the history of Greg was again brought up by Swift in the Examiner, as a parallel attempt upon that statesman's life, although conducted by other means. See two Examiners on this subject, Nos. XXXII. and XXXIII. An answer was made to this accusation on the Whig party, by their professed champion the conductor of the Medley, in No. XXVI. But the charge of subornation was still more directly urged against the lords of the committee by one Francis Hoffman, in a pamphlet called, "Secret Transactions during the hundred days Mr William Greg lay in Newgate under sentence of death for high treason, from the day of his sentence to the day of his execution." This piece

contains Greg's dying declaration, and a letter from the Rev. Mr Paul Lorraine, the ordinary of Newgate, stating the solicitations which had been used with Greg while in prison, and his uniform and solemn exculpation of Mr Harley. This pamphlet called forth in reply, "A Letter to the seven Lords of the Committee appointed to examine Greg;" the purpose of which was, to clear these noblemen of the foul inuendo fixed upon them by the author of the Examiner, and by the publication called "Secret Transactions."

As in this contest the character of the Tory minister of state and those of the leading nobles of the Whig party were put at issue in opposition to each other, it was thought necessary that Swift should enter the combat in reply to the letter to the Seven Lords. In his Journal, August 24, 1711, he informs Stella, with his usual affectation of reserve, "there is a pamphlet come out in answer

to a Letter to the Seven Lords who examined Greg. The answer is by the real author of the Examiner, as I believe, for it is very well written." I have already stated my opinion, that in this and similar passages, Swift had no intention to conceal from Stella his real concern in political publications, but merely to guard against the chance of an intercepted letter becoming evidence against the writer.

THOSE Who have given themselves the trouble to write against me, either in single papers or pamphlets, (and they are pretty numerous,) do all agree in discovering a violent rage, and at the same time affecting an air of contempt toward their adversary; which, in my humble opinion, are not very consistent and therefore it is plain, that their fury is real and hearty, their contempt only personated. I have pretty well studied this matter, and would caution writers of their standard, never to engage in that difficult attempt of despising; which is a work to be done in cold blood, and only by a superior genius, to one at some distance beneath him. I can truly affirm, I have had a very sincere contempt for many of those who have drawn their pens against me; yet I rather chose the cheap way of discovering it by silence and neglect, than be at the pains of new terms to express it I have known a lady value herself upon a haughty disdainful look, which very few understood, and nobody alive regarded. Those common place terms of infamous scribbler, prostitute libeller, and the like, thrown abroad without propriety or provocation, do ill personate the true spirit of contempt, because they are such as the meanest writer, whenever he pleases, may

*

* In the Letter, the author of the Examiner was treated as the

use toward the best. I remember indeed a parish fool, who, with a great deal of deformity, carried the most disdainful look I ever observed in any countenance and it was the most prominent part of his folly; but he was thoroughly in earnest, which these writers are not: for there is another thing I would observe, that my antagonists are most of them so, in a literal sense; breathe real vengeance, and extend their threats to my person, if they knew where to find it; wherein they are so far from despising, that I am sensible they do me too much honour. The author of the Letter to the Seven Lords takes upon him the three characters of a despiser, a threatener, and a railer; and succeeds so well in the two last, that it has made him miscarry in the first. It is no unwise proceeding, which the writers of that side have taken up, to scatter their menaces in every paper they publish; it may perhaps look absurd, ridiculous, and impudent, in people at mercy to assume such a style ; but the design is right, to endeavour persuading the world that it is they who are the injured party, that they are the sufferers, and have a right to be angry.

However, there is one point, wherein these gentlemen seem to stretch this wise expedient a little farther than it will allow. I, who for several months undertook to examine into the late management of persons and things, was content sometimes to give only a few hints of certain matters, which I had charity enough to wish might be buried for ever in oblivion, if the confidence of these people had not forced them from me. One instance whereof, among many, is the business of

most stupid blunderer, the falsest scribbler, the most abandoned wretch, the scum of mankind, and the basest flatterer alive.

Gregg, the subject of a letter I am now considering. If this piece has been written by direction, as I should be apt to suspect, yet, I am confident, they would not have us think so, because it is a sort of challenge, to let the world into the whole secret of Gregg's affair. But I suppose they are confident, it is what I am not master of, wherein it is odds but they may be mistaken; for I believe the memorials of that transaction are better preserved, than they seem to be aware of, as perhaps may one day appear.

This writer is offended, because I have said so many severe things with application to particular persons. The Medley has been often in the same story; if they condemn it as a crime in general, I shall not much object; at least I will allow it should be done with truth and caution; but, by what argument will they undertake to prove that it is pardonable on one side, and not on the other? Since the late change of ministry, I have observed many of that party take up a new style, and tell us, “That this way of personal reflection ought not to be endured; they could not approve of it; it was against charity and good manners." When the Whigs were in power, they took special care to keep their adversaries silent; then all kind of falsehood and scurrility was doing good service to the cause, and detecting evil principles. Now, that the face of things is changed, and we have liberty to retort upon them, they are for calling down fire from heaven upon us; though, by a sort of indulgence which they were strangers to, we allow them equal liberty of the press with ourselves; and they even now make greater use of it, against persons in the highest power and credit, than