s of insolent
subjects, bent upon such designs as must probably end in the ruin of the
government; to find out means for paying such exorbitant debts as this
nation hath been involved in, and reduce it to a better management; to
make a potent enemy offer advantageous terms of peace, and deliver up
the most important fortress of his kingdom, as a security;[11] and this
against all the opposition, mutually raised and inflamed by parties and
allies; such performances can only be called cunning by those whose want
of understanding, or of candour, puts them upon finding ill names for
great qualities of the mind, which themselves do neither possess, nor
can form any just conception of. However, it must be allowed, that an
obstinate love of secrecy in this minister seems, at distance, to have
some resemblance of cunning; for he is not only very retentive of
secrets, but appears to be so too, which I number amongst his defects.
He hath been blamed by his friends for refusing to discover his
intentions, even in those points where the wisest man may have need of
advice and assistance, and some have censured him, upon that account, as
if he were jealous of power but he hath been heard to answer, "That he
seldom did otherwise, without cause to repent"

[Footnote 11: This is surely a piece of Swift's partiality for Oxford;
since it practically deprives Bolingbroke of whatever credit was his for
the Peace of Utrecht, and that was not a little; certainly more than may
be given to Oxford. [T.S.]]

However, so undistinguished a caution cannot, in my opinion, be
justified, by which the owner loseth many advantages, and whereof all
men, who deserved to be confided in, may with some reason complain. His
love of procrastination (wherein doubtless nature hath her share) may
probably be increased by the same means, but this is an imputation laid
upon many other great ministers, who, like men under too heavy a load,
let fall that which is of the least consequence, and go back to fetch it
when their shoulders are free, for time is often gained, as well as
lost, by delay, which at worst is a fault on the securer side.[12]
Neither probably is this minister answerable for half the clamour raised
against him upon that article: his endeavours are wholly turned upon the
general welfare of his country, but perhaps with too little regard to
that of particular persons, which renders him less amiable, than he
would otherwise have been from the goodness