, possessed all power at court. So that the first
umbrage given to the Whigs, and the pretences for clamouring against
France and the Pretender, were derived from them. And I believe nothing
appeared then more unlikely, than that such different opinions should
ever incorporate; that party having upon former occasions treated those
very persons with enmity enough. But some l[or]ds then about court, and
in the Qu[een]'s good graces, not able to endure those growing
impositions upon the prince and people, presumed to interpose, and were
consequently soon removed and disgraced: However, when a most exorbitant
grant was proposed,[6] antecedent to any visible merit, it miscarried in
Parliament, for want of being seconded by those who had most credit in
the House, and who having always opposed the like excesses in a former
reign, thought it their duty to do so still, to shew the world that the
dislike was not against persons but things. But this was to cross the
oligarchy in the tenderest point, a point which outweighed all
considerations of duty and gratitude to their prince, or regard to the
constitution. And therefore after having in several private meetings
concerted measures with their old enemies, and granted as well as
received conditions, they began to change their style and their
countenance, and to put it as a maxim in the mouths of their emissaries,
that England must be saved by the Whigs. This unnatural league was
afterwards cultivated by another incident; I mean the Act of Security,[7]
and the consequences of it, which every body knows; when (to use the
words of my correspondent)[8] "the sovereign authority was parcelled out
among a faction, and made the purchase of indemnity for an offending
M[iniste]r:" Thus the union of the two kingdoms improved that between the
ministry and the j[u]nto, which was afterwards cemented by their mutual
danger in that storm they so narrowly escaped about three years ago;[9]
but however was not quite perfected till the Prince's death;[10] and then
they went lovingly on together, both satisfied with their several shares,
at full liberty to gratify their predominant inclinations; the first,
their avarice and ambition; the other, their models of innovation in
Church and State.

Therefore, whoever thinks fit to revive that baffled question, "Why was
the late ministry changed?" may receive the following answer; That it was
become necessary by the insolence and avarice of some about the Qu