have felt more indignation against thofe who bribed the printer to betray you, than against you who were betrayed; because it was a mean villainy, almoft equal to the treacherous publication of a private, friendly, confidential Letter; but a villainy of which you can now complain no more.

Wilkes, with the education of a Gentleman, has exceeded in meanness and want of fentiment his fervant Curry. In the year 1767, I first knew fome part of your private character, and no fooner knew than avoided you. Since that time, in the progrefs of my exceffive induftry to extricate you from your difficulties, I have to my astonishment found to be true not only all that has been alledged against you, but much more. However, were it poffible to add to the measure of your private turpitude, it would not prevent me from acting over again in the fame manner I have done; and was there an election for Middlesex to-morrow, (the right of the electors being left unvindicated), or any other point of public concern, the benefit which you might receive from my labour or my fufferings, fhould not make me in the least relax the one or decline the other.

6, 7. I was your friend only for the fake of the public caufe: That reafon does in certain matters remain; as far as it remains, fo far I am ftill your friend; and therefore I faid in my first Letter, "The Public fhould know how far they ought, and how far they ought not to fupport you." To bring to punishment the great delinquents who have corrupted the parliament and the feats of juflice; who have encouraged, pardoned, and rewarded murder; to heal the breaches made in the conftitution, and by falutary provifions to prevent them for the future; to replace once more, not the administration and execution, for which they are very unfit, but the checks of government really in the hands of the governed;

For thefe purposes, if it were poffible to fuppofe that the great enemy of mankind could be rendered inftrumental to their happinefs, fo far the devil himself fhould be fupported by the people. For a human inftrument they fhould go farther; he should not only be fupported, but thanked and rewarded for the good which perhaps he did not intend, as an encouragement to others to follow his example. But if the foul Fiend, having gained their fupport, fhould endeavour to delude the weaker part, and intice them to an idolatrous worship of himfelf, by perfuading them that what he fuggefted was their voice, and their voice the voice of God: If he should attempt to obtruct every thing that leads to their fecurity and happinefs, and to promote every wickedness that tends only to his own emolument: If when the caufe-the caufe-reverberates on their ears, he fhould divert thefe from the original found, and direct them towards the oppofite unfaithful echo: If confufion fhould be all his aim, and mifchief his fole enjoyment, would not he act the part of a faithful monitor to the people, who fhould fave them from their fnares, by reminding them of the true object of their conftitutional wor

ship,

fhip, expreffed in thofe words of Holy Writ (for to me it is fo) Rex, Lex loquens, Lex, Rex mutus. This is the cause the cause To make this union indiffoluble is the only caufe I acknowledge. As far as the fupport of Mr. Wilkes tends to this point, I am as warm as the warmeft: But all the lines of your projects are drawn towards a different center-yourfelf; and if with a good intention, I have been diligent to gain you powers which may be perverted to mifchief, I am bound to be doubly diligent to prevent their being fo employed.

8. The diligence I have ufed for two years paft, and the fuccefs I have had in defeating all your fhameful schemes, is the true caufe of the diffention between us. I have never had any private pique or quarrel with you. It was your policy in paragraphs and anonymous letters to pretend it; but you cannot mene tion any private caufe of pique or quarrel.

To prevent the mifchief of divifion to a popular oppofition, thofe who faw both your bad intentions and your actions were flent; and whilst they defeated all your projects, they were cautious to conceal your defeats. They ftudied fo much the more to fatisfy your voracious prodigality, and thought, as I should have done if a minifter, that if feeding it would keep you from mifchief, a few thousands would be well employed by the public for that purpofe. But I can never, merely for the fake of strengthen ing oppofition, join in thofe actions which would prevent all the good effects to be hoped from oppofition, and for the fake of which alone any oppofition to government can be juftifiable. Such a practice would very well fuit those who with a change of minifters. For my part I wifh no fuch thing; bad as the prefent are, I am afraid the next will not be better, though I am fure they cannot be worse. I care not under whofe administration good comes. But the people muft owe it to themselves, nor ought they to receive the restoration oftheir rights as a favour from any fet of men, minifter, or king. The moment they accept it as a grant, a favour, an act of Grace, the people have not the prospect of a Right left. They will from that time become like the mere poffeffors of an eftate without a title, and of which they may be difpoffeffed at pleafure. If the people are not powerful enough to make a bad adminiftration or a bad king do them juftice, they will not often have a good one. Would to God, the time would come, which I am afraid is very distant beyond the period of my life, when an honeft man could not be in oppofition; I declare [ fhould rejoice to find the patronage of a minifter in the smalleft degree my honour and intereft. I never have pretended to any more than to prefer the former to the latter. But it is not upon me alone that you have poured forth your abufe, but upon every man of honour who has deferved well of the public; and if you were permitted to proceed without interruption, there would fhortly not be found one honeft man who would not shudder to deferve well of the people.

The

The true reafon of our diffention being made public, is, that you could not get on a step without it; and you trust that the popularity of your name, and your diligence in paragraphing the papers, will outweigh with the people the moft effential fervices of others; and that you fhall get rid of all controul by taking away from thofe who mean well, the confidence of the people. If you can once get them affronted by the public, whom they have faithfully ferved, you flatter yourfelf that difguft will make them retire from a fcene where fuch a man as you are, covered with infamy like your's, has the difpofal of honour and difgrace, and the characters of honeft men at his mercy.

I mean to prove what I have faid by facts, and though it does not come in the regular order of time which I meant to obferve, nor with that strength with which a number of preceding tranfactions made it affect my mind, I will now mention one, which, with two or three others, made you despair of ufing me in your plans, and made you haften the rupture.

Some time in laft July, when I was upon a vifit to Mr. Alderman Oliver at Putney, you came there, and perfuaded me to go with you to your house at Fulham, where I had never before been, that we might the next morning go together by water to London. In the boat you began with me a converfation about the city, as exactly as I can recollect to the following effect.

W. "I think I ought to confider fomething about providing for my friends and being prepared with candidates for the city offices. Give me your opinion: who do you think fhould be Town Clerk ?

H." Why is Sir James Hodges dead?

W. No; but he is not very young, nor in very good health; and one ought to be prepared against accidents. There fhould always be a candidate fixed upon ready.

H." Since you have afked my opinion about it, I will give it you freely I think directly the contrary. Confider your fituation; your influence is not perfonal, but depends entirely upon the propriety of your meafures. Though you may confider of the thing in your mind, you should never fix upon a candidate till the very time of election, nor talk about it to any one. The man that might be moft proper this year may be very improper the next. It is your bufinefs, when the time comes, to confiter who is the most fit for the purpofe, and has the best claim to the favour of the citizens; and if thofe circumftances are nearly equal in different candidates, then to adopt him who is the moit likely to fucceed: by which means the party you efpoufe will generally be victorious; and you will have the credit of having carried many a candidate by your intereft, when indeed he will be carried by the merits of his own pretenfions and fhould you at any time mifcarry, your defeat will do you no harm; for every one will acknowledge that your man ought to have fucceeded; and by feeing you always efpoufe the moft worthy, the public will in time have a trong inducement to fupport your candidates

candidates, and will reafonably conclude that he is probably the moft worthy whom you efpoufe: whereas by following a different courfe, though you may fucceed once or twice, your very fucceffes will difgrace you, and enfure a future defeat.

W." All this may do very well in theory; but Reynolds has done fo much and is every day doing fo much for me, that I think he ought to be fixed upon as Town Clerk.

H." In my opinion you have fixed upon the last man in the city that fhould be thought of for that office; and I may speak it the more freely, becaufe Reynolds has experienced that I do not want an inclination to ferve him. When he fent Mr. Trn to defire me to ask Mr. Sawbridge to appoint him his undersheriff, he knows that there was not a minute between Tr-——n's application to me and Mr. Sawbridge's granting my request: he knows too the fteps I have fince taken to ferve him in that line. There is nothing improper in his being under-fheriff, becaufe that is a private favour granted by the Sheriff who ferves the office at a very great expence. But the lucrative city offices are very different things: they ought always to be difpofed of to the old citizens of long ftanding, not to thofe who make themselves free for the purpofe; to men of refpectable characters, who can plead fervices to the city; or at least to those who with equal merit have not perhaps been fo fuccefsful as their neighbours, and are very not fo eafy in their fortunes as their fellow-citizens think they deferve. Reynolds has not the leaft claim: he is a freeman only. of yesterday; and you will certainly forfeit the esteem and fupport of the citizens, and uarrow yourself to a very fmall circle indeed, if they fee you endeavouring to confine all the emoluments of the city to your attorneys, agents and particular adhe rents, to the exclufion of those who have long borne the burden of the city, and whofe right thofe offices are." You ought, on the contrary, on thefe occafions to affift worth and merit wherever you find it, whether amongst your own party, or out of it, or even among your adverfaries; and by fo doing your enemies will be lefs jea ous of your power and lefs bitter, and the number of your friends will increafe as the approbation of your conduct increafes."

Mr. Wilkes feemed much chagrined and did not at all relish my arguments, but turned the converfation to other fubjects. About ten days afterwards Mr. Reynolds came to me and told me he defired my advice and affiftance; that Mr. Wilkes had been talking to him about being town-clerk. I repeated to Mr. Reynolds the arguments I had used to Mr. Wilkes, with many others. particularly affecting Mr. Reynolds; and Mr. Reynolds told me he was convinced by what I had faid, and should think no more of it.

(To be continued.)