You say that Mr. Foote did not fee the deceased until after his death. A furgeon, my Lord, muft know very little of his profeffion, if, upon examining a wound, or a contufion, he cannot determine whether it was mortal or not.-While the party is alive, a furgeon will be cautious of pronouncing; whereas by the death of the patient, he is enabled to confider both cause and effect in one view, and to speak with a certainty confirmed by experience.

Yet we are to thank your Grace for the establishment of a new tribunal. Your inquifitio poft mortem is unknown to the laws of England, and does honour to your invention. The only material objection to it is, that if Mr. Foote's evidence was infufficient, because he did not examine the wound till after the death of the party, much lefs can a negative opinion, given by gentlemen who never faw the body of Mr. Clarke, either before or af ter his decease, authorise you to fuperfede the verdict of a jury, and sentence of the law.

Now, my Lord, let me ask you, Has it never occurred to your Grace, while you were withdrawing this defperate wretch from that justice which the laws had awarded, and which the whole people of England demanded against him, that there is another man, who is the favourite of his country, whofe pardon would have been accepted with gra

titude,

titude, whose pardon would have healed all our di vifions? Have you quite forgotten that this man was once your Grace's friend? Or is it to murderers only that you will extend the mercy of the crown?

These are questions you will not anfwer. Nor is it neceffary. The character of your private life, and the uniform tenour of your public conduct, is an answer to them all.

JUNIUS.

X.

LETTER

To his Grace the DUKE of GRAFTON.

My LORD,

April 10. 1769. Have so good an opinion of your Grace's dif

*

cernment, that when the author of the vindication of your conduct affures us, that he writes from his own mere motion, without the leaft authority from your Grace, I should be ready enough to believe him, but for one fatal mark, which feems to be fixed upon every measure, in which either your personal or your political character is concerned. Your first attempt to support Sir William Proctor ended in the election of Mr. Wilkes; the fecond enfured fuccefs to Mr. Glynn. The extraordinary step you took to make Sir James Lowther Lord Paramount of Cumberland, has ruined his intereft in that county for ever.

The

E

Mr. Edward Weston.

Houfe

Houfe Lift of Directors was curfed with the con currence of government; and even the miferable Dingly could not efcape the misfortunes of your Grace's protection. With this uniform experience before us, we are authorised to fufpect, that when a pretended vindication of your principles and conduct in reality contains the bittereft reflections upon both, it could not have been written without your immediate direction and affiftance. The author indeed calls God to witnefs for him, with all the fincerity, and in the very terms of an Irish evidence, to the best of his knowledge and belief. My Lord, you should not encourage thefe appeals to heaven. The pious Prince from whom you are fuppofed to defcend, made fuch frequent ufe of them in his public declarations, that at laft the people also found it neceffary to appeal to heaven in their turn. Your administration has driven us into circumstances of equal diftrefs;-beware at leaft how you remind us of the remedy.

You have already much to answer for. You have provoked this unhappy gentleman to play the fool once more in public life, in fpite of his years and infirmities, and to fhew us, that, as you yourfelf are a fingular inftance of youth without fpirit, ́the man who defends you is a no less remarkable example of age without the benefit of experience. To follow fuch a writer minutely would, like his

own

own periods, be a labour without end. The fubject too has been already difcuffed, and is fufficiently understood. I cannot help obferving, however, that, when the pardon of MacQuirk was the principal charge against you, it would have been but a decent compliment to your Grace's understanding, to have defended you upon your own principles. What credit does a man deserve, who tells us plainly, that the facts fet forth in the King's proclamation were not the true motives on which the pardon was granted, and that he wishes that thofe chirurgical reports which firft gave occafion to certain doubts in the royal breast, had not been laid before his Majefty. You fee, my Lord, that even your friends cannot defend your actions, without changing your principles, nor justify a deliberate measure of government, without contradicting the main affertion on which it was founded.

The conviction of MacQuirk had reduced you to a dilemma, in which it was hardly poffible for you to reconcile your political intereft with your duty. You were obliged either to abandon an active useful partizan, or to protect a felon from public juftice. With your usual spirit, you preferred your intereft to every other confideration; and with your ufual judgment, you founded your

determination upon the only motives which should not have been given to the public.

I have frequently cenfured Mr. Wilkes's con. duct, yet your advocate reproaches me with having devoted myself to the fervice of fedition. Your Grace can beft inform us, for which of Mr. Wilkes's good qualities you firft honoured him with your friendship, or how long it was before you discovered those bad ones in him, at which, it feems, your delicacy was offended. Remember, my Lord, that you continued your connexion with Mr. Wilkes long after he had been convicted of thofe crimes, which you have fince taken pains to represent in the blackest colours of blafphemy and treafon. How unlucky is it, that the first instance you have given us of a fcrupulous regard to decorum is united with the breach of a moral obligation! For my own part, my Lord, I am proud to affirm, that, if I had been weak enough to form fuch a friendship, I would never have been base enough to betray it. But, let Mr. Wilkes's cha racter be what it may, this at leaft is certain, that, circumstanced as he is with regard to the public, even his vices plead for him. The people of England have too much difcernment to fuffer your Grace to take advantage of the failings of a private character, to establish a precedent by which

the