and that gentleman's intereft was fo great in his own county of Wilts, that he represented it in two parliaments in a former reign. His father alfo was then the reprefentative for the fame; and the intereft of his wife's family in the house was very extenfive. Thus Bolingbroke took his feat with many accidental helps, but his chief and great resource lay in his own extenfive abilities.

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At that time the whig and the tory parties were ftrongly oppofed in the house, and pretty nearly balanced. In the latter years of King William the tories, who from every motive were oppofed to the court, had been gaining popularity, and now began to make a public ftand against their competitors. Robert Harley, afterwards earl of Oxford, a ftaunch and confirmed tory, was in the year 1700 chosen speaker of the house of commons, and was continued in the fame upon the acceffion of Queen Anne the year enfuing. Bolingbroke had all along been bred up, as was before obferved, among the diffenters, his friends leaned to that perfuafion, and all his connexions were in the whig intereft. However, either from principle, or from perceiving the tory party to be then gaining ground, while the whigs were declining, he foon changed his connexions, and joined himself to Harley, for whom then he had the greatest esteem: nor did he bring him his vote alone, but his opinion; which even before the end of his firft feffion he rendered very confiderable, the houfe perceiving even in fo young a speaker the greatest eloquence, united with the profoundeft difcernment. The year following he was again chofen anew for the fame borough, and perfevered in his former attachments, by which he gained fuch an authority and influence in the house, that it was thought proper to reward his merit; and on the 10th of April 1704, he was appointed fecretary at war, and of the marines, his friend Harley having a little before been made fecretary of ftate.

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The tory party being thus established in power, it may eafily be fuppofed that every method would be ufed to deprefs the whig intereft, and to prevent it from rifing; yet fo much juftice was done even to merit in an enemy, that the Duke of Marlborough, who might be confidered as at the head of the oppofite party, was fupplied with all the neceffaries for carrying on the war in Flanders with vigour; and it is remarkable, that the greatest events of his campaigns, fuch as the battles of Blenheim and Ramillies, and feveral glorious attempts made by the Duke to fhorten the war by fome decifive action, fell out while Bolingbroke was Secretary at War. In fact he was a fincere admirer of that great General, and avowed it upon all occafions to the last moment of his life he knew his faults, he admired his virtues, and had the boaft of being inftrumental in giving luftre to those triumphs, by which his own power was in a manner overthrown.

As the affairs of the nation were then in as fluctuating a state as at prefent, Harley, after maintaining the lead for above three years, was in his turn obliged to fubmit to the whigs, who once more became the prevailing party, and he was compelled to refign the feals. The friendship between him and Bolingbrokę seemed at this time to have been fincere and difinterefted; for the latter chose to follow his fortune, and the next day refigned his employments in the adminiftration, following his friend's example, and setting an example at once of integrity and moderation. As an inftance of this, when his coadjutors the tories were for carrying a violent measure in the House of Commons, in order to bring the Princess Sophia into England, Bolingbroke fo artfully opposed it, that it dropt without a debate. For this his moderation was praised, but perhaps at the expence of his fagacity.

For fome time the whigs feemed to have gained a complete triumph, and upon the election of a new D3 Parliament,

Parliament, in the year 1708, Bolingbroke was not returned. The interval which followed of above two years, he employed in the fevereft study; and this reclufe period he ever after used to confider as the moft active and ferviceable of his whole life. But his retirement was foon interrupted by the prevailing of his party once more; for the Whig Parliament being diffolved in the year 1710, he was again chofen, and Harley being made Chancellor, and undertreasurer of the Exchequer, the important poft of Secretary of State was given to our author, in which he difcovered a degree of genius and affiduity, that perhaps have never been known to be united in one perfon to the fame degree.

The English annals fcarcely produce a more trying juncture, or that required fuch various abilities to regulate. He was then placed in a fphere, where he was obliged to conduct the machine of ftate, ftruggling with a thousand various calamities: a defperate enraged party, whofe characteristic it has ever been to bear none in power but themfelves; a war conducted by an able general, his profeffed opponent, and whofe victories only tended to render him every day more formidable; a foreign enemy, poffef fed of endless refources, and feeming to gather ftrength from every defeat; an infidious alliance, that wanted only to gain the advantage of victory, without contributing to the expences of the combat; a weak declining miftrefs, that was led by every report, and feemed ready to liften to whatever was faid against him; ftill more, a gloomy, indolent, and fufpicious colleague, that envied his power, and hated him for his abilities: these were a part of the difficulties that Bolingbroke had to ftruggle with in office, and under which he was to conduct the treaty of peace of Utrecht, which was confidered as one of the most complicated negotiations that hiftory can afford. But nothing feemed too great for his abilities and industry;

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he fet himself to the undertaking with fpirit; he began to pave the way to the intended treaty, by making the people difcontented at the continuance of the war; for this purpose he employed himself in drawing up accurate computations of the numbers of our own men, and that of foreigners employed in its deftructive progrefs. He even wrote in the Examiners, and other periodical papers of the times, fhewing how much of the burden refted upon England, and how little was fuftained by those who falfly boafted their alliance. By these means, and after much debate in the House of Commons, the Queen received a petition from Parliament, fhewing the hardships the allies had put upon England in carrying on this war, and confequently how neceffary it was to apply relief to fo ill-judged a connexion. It may be easily fuppofed that the Dutch, against whom this petition was chiefly levelled, did all that was in their power to oppose it; many of the foreign courts alfo, with whom we had any tranfactions, were continually at work to defeat the minifter's intentions, Memorial was delivered after memorial; the people of England, the Parliament, and all Europe, were made acquainted with the injuftice and the dangers of fuch a proceeding however Bolingbroke went on with fteadiness and refolution; and although the attacks of his enemies at home might have beeen deemed fufficient to employ his attention, yet he was obliged at the fame time that he furnished materials to the prefs in London, to furnish instructions to all our minifters and ambaffadors abroad, who would do nothing but in pursuance of his directions. As an orator in the fenate he exerted all his eloquence, he stated all the great points that were brought before the house, he anfwered the objections that were made by the leaders of the oppofition; and all this with fuch fuccefs, that even his enemies, while they oppofed his power, acknowledged his abilities. Indeed, fuch were the dif ficulties

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ficulties he had to encounter, that we find him ac knowledging himself some years after, that he never looked back on this great event, paffed as it was, without a fecret emotion of mind, when he compared the vaftnefs of the undertaking, and the importance of the fuccefs, with the means employed to bring it about, and with thofe which were employed to fruf trate his intentions.

While he was thus induftriously employed, he was not without the rewards that deferved to follow fuch abilities, joined to fo much affiduity. In July 1712, he was created Baron St. John of Lidyard Tregoze in Wiltshire, and Viscount Bolingbroke; by the last of which titles he is now generally known, and is likely to be talked of by pofterity: he was alfo the fame year appointed Lord Lieutenant of the County of Effex. By the titles of Tregoze and Bolingbroke he united the honours of the elder and younger branch of his family; and thus tranfmitted into one channel the oppofing intereft of two races, that had been diftinguished, one for their loyalty to King Charles I. the other for their attachment to the Parliament that opposed him. It was afterwards his boast, that he fteered clear of the extremes for which his ancestors had been diftinguished, having kept the fpirit of the one, and acknowledged the fubordination that diftinguished the other.

Bolingbroke, being thus raised very near the fummit of power, began to perceive more nearly the défects of him who was placed there. He now began to find that Lord Oxford, whofe party he had followed, and whofe perfon he had efteemed, was by no means fo able or fo induftrious as he fuppofed him to be. He now began from his heart to renounce the friendship which he once had for his coadjutor; he began to imagine him treacherous, mean, indolent, and invidious; he even began to afcribe his

own