oppressive administration.

It is, therefore, with the utmost satisfaction of mind, that I reflect
how often I have employed my pen in vindication of the present ministry,
and their dependants and adherents; how often I have detected the
specious fallacies of the advocates for independence; how often I have
softened the obstinacy of patriotism; and how often triumphed over the
clamour of opposition.

I have, indeed, observed but one set of men, upon whom all my arguments
have been thrown away; whom neither flattery can draw to compliance, nor
threats reduce to submission; and who have, notwithstanding all
expedients that either invention or experience could suggest, continued
to exert their abilities in a vigorous and constant opposition of all
our measures.

The unaccountable behaviour of these men, the enthusiastick resolution
with which, after a hundred successive defeats, they still renewed their
attacks; the spirit with which they continued to repeat their arguments
in the senate, though they found a majority determined to condemn them;
and the inflexibility with which they rejected all offers of places and
preferments, at last excited my curiosity so far, that I applied myself
to inquire, with great diligence, into the real motives of their
conduct, and to discover what principle it was that had force to inspire
such unextinguishable zeal, and to animate such unwearied efforts.

For this reason I attempted to cultivate a nearer acquaintance with some
of the chiefs of that party, and imagined that it would be necessary,
for some time, to dissemble my sentiments, that I might learn theirs.

Dissimulation, to a true politician, is not difficult, and, therefore, I
readily assumed the character of a proselyte; but found, that their
principle of action was no other, than that which they make no scruple
of avowing in the most publick manner, notwithstanding the contempt and
ridicule to which it every day exposes them, and the loss of those
honours and profits from which it excludes them.

This wild passion, or principle, is a kind of fanaticism by which they
distinguish those of their own party, and which they look upon as a
certain indication of a great mind. _We_ have no name for it _at court_;
but, among themselves, they term it by a kind of cant phrase, "a regard
for posterity."

This passion seems to predominate in all their conduct, to regulate
every action of their lives, and sentiment of their minds: I hav